


When You're Out of Options

by OraRiposo, Primadox



Category: Assassin's Creed, ProtoCreed - Fandom, Prototype (Video Game), alex/altair, altair/alex
Genre: Fanfiction, M/M, ProtoCreed, zeus/alex
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-06-21
Updated: 2016-07-21
Packaged: 2017-12-15 16:25:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 17
Words: 70,164
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/851601
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OraRiposo/pseuds/OraRiposo, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Primadox/pseuds/Primadox
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Altaїr has been transported forward in time by the Apple of Eden, and he comes face to face with none other than Alex J. Mercer, the man with the most kills under his belt in that time period. How will killer react to killer? Rated M for later chapters AltaїrxAlex and graphic depictions of violence and swearing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. First Encounter

**Author's Note:**

> As always, I don't own any of the characters, and some of the ideas belong to my co-author. Thanks for taking the time to read this! Hope you like it~
> 
> P.S. I'll be following the Prototype story line for the most part, though a few things will be out of order to flow well with scenes as they unfold. Bear with me, things will work out eventually.

Altaїr Ibn-La'Ahad sat hunched over his desk in the dark shadows of his study. The quill he used was as stained as his fingers, the fibers of the feather frayed and inky black. The assassin's eyes were bloodshot and he only noticed his fatigue when he placed his quill down and sat back in his seat. His body voiced various complaints: hunger, thirst, a need to relieve himself, and various aches from sitting for so long. How long had he lost this time? A day? Longer? He'd lost track before, but Maria usually came looking for him if he was lost for too long. And where was Maria? Had she returned from the market yet? How long ago had she said she was going out?

Exhaustion weighed heavily on Altaїr, burdening his mind and body further than he thought he could take. He closed his eyes as the room began to spin and the faintly-glowing orb on the desk in front of him split into four images. He rubbed his temples and muttered a prayer for strength under his breath, shuddering as he reasserted control over his body. He took a moment's pause before bracing his hands on the arms of his chair and pushing himself to his feet.

The room was littered with scrolls and crates that proved to be more difficult to navigate than Altaїr was apparently ready to handle. He kicked a crate, swore and staggered around it, catching himself on a pyramid of scrolls that rolled and scattered when he landed on them.

"Damn it all," the assassin growled as he levered himself back to his feet and maneuvered his way across the room. He found the door in short order and pulled on the handle. It didn't budge. There was a stack of ancient, hefty tomes as high as his hip piled in front of the door and he had to lift them one at a time to set them carefully aside.

All in all, it took nearly ten minutes for Altaїr to open his study's door. And when he did, he hissed and held an arm up to shade his eyes from the piercing sunlight that shone through the window in the hallway.

He muttered grumpily under his breath as his eyes adjusted to the bright light and he stalked out into his house's main room, kicking a pillow across the floor. He took care of his various needs, spending a long moment out at the well sating his thirst and wiping a cool, wet rag along the back of his neck. The sun beat down on him mercilessly, uncaring of the energy it sapped from his already-exhausted limbs. He sighed, lowered the bucket into the well and walked back into the house. He paused just inside the door, wondering where his wife was.

A peek into the kitchen revealed it to be empty except for a freshly-baked loaf of Masa bread resting on the counter. He looked around again, then walked cautiously toward the bread. It smelled warm and fragrant. It would probably be crisp on the outside and melt on his tongue when he chewed it. His mouth watered as he neared the counter and he reached toward the knife laying just beside it. Surely Maria wouldn't mind if he took just a small piece? Or the whole loaf...his stomach agreed with that.

Altaїr reached out to take the bread and yelped when a rod of wood as thick around as his wrist smacked his knuckles. He jerked his hand away and turned to admonish whichever novice had the gall to strike him and found his wife standing in the doorway beside the counter, scowling at him. His words withered in his throat and he held his hand to his chest, taking a small half-step back as his anger cooled into cautious and loving respect of his wife's strength and lack of concern for his rank as Grandmaster. He could have worn a crown and she would still whack him over the head when he deserved it.

"And just what do you think you're doing?" she demanded. Her voice was honeyed by the accent of her homeland, but it did nothing to soothe her tone.

Altaїr rubbed his hand begrudgingly and said, "I was hungry."

"Then you'd best find something else to eat," Maria said primly. "I spent all day making this bread. I won't have your thieving little fingers touching it until dinner. Especially while they've got ink on them." She studied him and made a distasteful sound. "Look at you," she said, gesturing menacingly at him with the rolling pin. "You're a mess! I leave for three days and you fall into ruins. Did you never learn how to take care of yourself?"

Altaїr's lips pressed together as he struggled to control his expression. Three days? That certainly wasn't the longest the Apple had enthralled him, but it was daunting to know he'd lost so much time. Besides that, three days in the desert without water could kill him just as easily as a sword in his belly. He would have to work out a system to make sure he could resurface long enough to tend to the needs of his body.

"I'll wash up," he said, his voice resigned.

"Right you will," his wife growled. "And I'll make sure you do it properly."

Altaїr loved Maria to the depths of his soul. She was everything he wanted in life and more. But the woman could be downright scary sometimes, and she didn't care who knew it. She grabbed him by his wrist and hauled him to the bathhouse which those who lived in the Masyaf Sanctuary shared. She stripped him of his robes so fast that it seemed he went from fully-clothed to naked in the blink of an eye. He didn't even have time to protest before she shoved him unceremoniously into the warm bath.

The Master flailed helplessly in the water for longer than he would admit to anyone who might ask before he got his feet under him and thrust up to the surface, spluttering and gasping. The water wasn't very deep. In fact, it only came up to his chest. It was more than enough to make him nervous, though.

"Was that necessary?" he asked, wiping water from his face so he could glare indignantly up at his wife.

"Absolutely," Maria said sternly, though her lips curved into a small smirk. She crossed her arms under her breasts, outlining them in the white tunic she wore over brown pants. "Now start washing. Or do I have to come in after you and do it myself?"

Altaїr grabbed one of the bars of soap from the side of the tub and scrubbed his chest, his stomach, sliding the bar over the muscles of his arms and his neck. He looked pointedly up at his wife and she nodded in satisfaction before turning on her heel and striding out of the bathhouse. Sighing, Altaїr settled into the water, scrubbing less vigorously. He closed his eyes and let his mind wander as he cleaned himself. It would have been easy for him to fall into the trance-like state he often entertained when he remembered his studies of the Apple, but the sting of soap in his eyes brought him back to the present. He finished washing, wrapped a piece of linen around his waist and walked back to the house he and Maria shared.

"Happy?" he asked as he passed the kitchen where Maria was kneading another mound of dough.

"Very," she said as she rinsed her hands off in a basin. As she dried them, she walked toward Altaїr and looked him over. She stretched up and kissed him softly, lovingly. Just as he started to return the kiss, she pulled back and whispered against his lips, "You need to shave," and then turned around and returned to her dough.

Frustrated but nonetheless patient, Altaїr sighed and continued down the hall toward his bedroom. He passed his study on the way and tried to ignore the tugging sensation he felt deep in the core of his being when he saw the Apple's glow. He had responsibilities, chores to tend to. There was a new group of novices he had to welcome and a training session to oversee. He didn't have time to transcribe any more wonders. He pushed past the study door and walked to his bedroom. He touched the door's handle and felt the hallway tilt madly around him. His stomach heaved and he leaned his brow against the cool wood of the door. The world righted itself after a long moment, and he breathed a short sigh of annoyance and relief as he pushed the door open.

The cold darkness of his study greeted him like an old friend, and his mouth worked as he tried to understand what had just happened. He looked over his shoulder at the door at the end of the hallway and then back to his study. How had he...

Altaїr abandoned the thought when the Apple's golden glow pulsed brighter, drawing his gaze to its flawless, carved surface. He stepped into the room and closed the door behind him, easily avoiding the scrolls and crates that had posed such a problem an hour before. The Apple of Eden greeted him warmly, caressing his thoughts like a long-lost lover as he took up his quill and set his trembling hand gently on the slightly-warm orb.

The familiar whispered voices he could hear but not understand flowed into his mind as the Apple's warmth spread up his fingers into his arm and over his shoulder. His eyelids felt heavy, and the will to keep them open evaporated in the face of that comforting, engulfing warmth. He closed his eyes and set his quill aside, laying his hand on the desk.

"Show me your wonders," he whispered.

The voices whispered fervently, their words louder and more demanding than they had ever been.  _Take it up,_  one whispered, and a chorus of others responded in kind, hissing the phrase again and again.

Altaїr grimaced as the orb's glow brightened until he could see it even through his eyelids. He turned his face away from the light and felt his hand slide across the desk's surface of its own accord. His touch was gentle as he lifted the Apple and held it in his hands. His fingers buzzed with latent energy that traveled up his wrists to his forearms, over his elbows and into his shoulders. He shivered as the metal pulsed in his hands and the warmth of the orb itself flowed into his body, casting away the aches of his age and the worries of his mind until all that remained was reverence and adoration for the artifact he held.

Heat spread down his torso, further down his legs, until his very toes tingled with the power he held. Altaїr's even breath quickened as the energy expanded, trilling up and down his spine like a child raking a stick across a wooden fence to hear the funny sounds it made. It rode a fine line between being pleasant and uncomfortable, straddling the very edge of his tolerance until it stepped deliberately over into discomfort.

Altaїr's eyes opened and he flinched in surprise when he saw that the room was lit as if the sun itself shone in his study. The candle on his desk had melted, its wax flowing away from him as the edges of the papers and scrolls around him browned, curled and then blackened in the heat.

"Maria!" he shouted, when his gaze moved to his arms. His very skin glowed with near-blinding gold radiance, and he cried again, "Maria! Come quickly!"

It didn't take long for Maria to reach the study, and when she flung open the door, she staggered to a halt, shielding her eyes from the unexpected light. She blinked rapidly, clearing her vision and squinting at him. "Altaїr, what's happening?" she asked, her voice sharp with fear. "What is that light?"

"I don't know!" Altaїr said in a high, panicked voice. "Help me!"

"How am I supposed to help you?" Maria asked. "I don't know what this is!" She tried to reach out to him, but shrank back with a cry of pain, holding her hand to her chest. Her fingertips were an angry red, and as Altaїr watched, blisters raised on the delicate skin.

"What do you want?" he demanded, glaring down at the Apple. He shook the artifact and snarled, "What do you want from me!" His vision blurred with tears whose source he couldn't have hoped to identify as the torrent of whispers returned, deafening him. He shook his head and clapped his left hand over his ear, whimpering, "I don't—I can't...too many voices..." He drew a few ragged breaths as the energy in his limbs transformed into a fierce burning and he cried out in frustration and fear.

Altaїr cocked his arm back as if to throw the Apple into the wall when he saw the look on Maria's face. Her eyes were wide, her expression tight with fear. She shuffled away a few steps, holding onto her hand protectively. "What has happened to you?" she whispered.

The assassin grimaced and hauled his arm back further to smash the artifact against the wall. The faces of agonized women and children screaming as their skin cracked and bled flashed in front of his eyes. Their blood boiled and their flesh blackened as fire consumed the earth. Altaїr lowered his hand and held the Apple close, whispering reassurances to it that he wouldn't break it, that he wouldn't dare.

"You are not the man I married, Altaїr," Maria whispered. "Your mind has been warped, corrupted..."

Altaїr shuddered and turned away from his wife, cradling the Apple to his chest even as his limbs burned agonizingly. He tried to respond, to say something to combat his wife's fears, but his voice caught in his throat, choked by the pain. Heat radiated from his limbs, growing hotter and hotter until he was convinced he was going to catch on fire.

When he thought he could stand the pain no longer, he heard Maria scream, but the sound cut off abruptly. He opened his eyes and saw white, nothing but blinding, empty absence. His stomach lurched as if he was falling from a great height, but the sensation ended as soon as it had begun when he smashed into something frighteningly, painfully, solid.

Altaїr let out a pitiful sound and he stretched out his arm, the Apple slipping from his fingers and halting a few inches away. Its luminous surface was black, as if it had been covered in soot from a fire pit, and the sun bleached its scorched surface to a dull gray. Slowly, the Master slipped into unconsciousness, glad to be away from the pain of the impact and that sickening heat that still burned in his flesh.

 

Midnight came and went, and still, Alex ordered drinks. The bartender had threatened to cut him off, but the hooded man had only to lift his gaze from his glass to persuade the fool otherwise. Alex's eyes focused on the amber drink and he lifted it to his lips, draining it in a single gulp.

"Another," he ordered.

"Sorry buddy," the bartender said in an obviously condescending tone, "we're closed."

Alex sniffed, set his glass aside and stood.

"You have to pay for the drinks," the other man protested.

"You're still breathing, right?" Alex said. "Seems I've paid you plenty."

Swallowing hard, the pudgy bartender nodded and looked down at the counter, scrubbing it with a rag. "It's on the house, sir," he said begrudgingly. Smart man.

Alex walked toward the door, smirked and said, "Keep the change." He slipped his hands into the pockets of his jacket and strode down the street toward his apartment. He'd spent the better part of the day trying to drink himself into a stupor but, alas, he had only achieved a light buzz.

He rounded a corner, feeling more annoyed than anything and stopped dead in his tracks when a bright flash of light brought his attention to an alleyway a block ahead of him. He grimaced and muttered, "The hell?" He walked toward the alleyway and frowned up at the angry storm clouds that rolled in overhead, blotting out the sunlight. "Strange weather."

Even stranger was what he found when he stepped into the alleyway. A man dressed in nothing but a dingy linen towel lay spread eagle on the ground with his head in an upturned container of Chinese food. His hand was scorched, his arm reaching out toward a black sphere not inches away from him. Rain pattered down around them, hissing into steam wherever it touched the man's skin. Alex looked up at the sky again and grimaced.

"Change that to freaky as hell," he said.

Cautiously, Alex walked toward the man and when nothing jumped up at him, he picked up the sphere. He hissed and bounced it from hand to hand, trying to keep the scalding metal from burning his skin. When the rain cooled it enough to handle, he scrubbed the surface with his jacket sleeve and grinned at the gleaming gold under the charred surface. It might be worth something.

Alex looked down at the haggard man at his feet, cocking a brow as he tried to imagine a scenario that would land him here. He had brown hair a little lighter than Alex's and it was cut very close to his head. A scar cut across his lips, disrupting the stubble that covered the man's jaw.

"Alright buddy, you're comin' with me," Alex announced, stuffing the sphere into his pocket and picking the man up. He flung the man over his shoulder, staggering to the alley wall when he became overbalanced to steady himself. "Keep your towel on, we're not goin' far. You can come back to your naked party when I'm through with you."

 


	2. Introductions

Alex had never put much stock in material possessions. His apartment was scarcely furnished with a rarely-used couch, a television which had never been turned on, and a painting beside the single window that still had its price tag on it.

Before the outbreak, Alex Mercer had spent most of his time at the breakfast nook in the apartment's kitchenette. From the time he got home from work to the time he left the next morning, the table would be a minefield of papers, files and books. Bringing his work home with him had been one of the 'perks' of his job, though he never complained. It kept him occupied and employed.

Now, the pantry was empty, the cupboards were full of lonely, dusty dishes, and the fridge was stocked with various brands of cheap beer.

With his bed occupied, Alex sat at the breakfast nook, his head bowed as he napped. He didn't sleep often, but when he did, it was as if the worries of the waking world vanished. His dreamless sleep was his only sanctuary from this waking nightmare. Anything in this city that had the balls to break into his apartment would sorely regret the decision the second he woke up.

Alex snorted softly and raised his head just enough to peek out from under his hood and make sure the stranger he'd brought home was still where he'd left him.

The man glowered at Alex from the bed where he'd been bound. He tugged pointedly at the handcuffs around his wrists and called, "You, boy! Untie me this instant."

Boy? That was rich. Alex rolled his shoulders and bowed his head again, closing his eyes and settling into the comfortable cushions of the breakfast nook. He slipped into a kind of half-sleep that let him rest and listen to his surroundings. He heard the man swearing, the metallic chitter of the handcuffs clanging against the metal bed frame, the quiet hum of the refrigerator, and quieter still, the sound of sirens and distant screams from deeper in the city.

Alex didn't stir until he heard something loud and uncomfortably close. It sounded like the snarling of some ancient beast in heat. It was...it was snoring. His snoring.

He jerked up and looked around the living room through bleary eyes, blinking his sleep away. He grimaced, rubbed his face, and stood from the table.

"Finally," the man sighed loudly. "Untie me. Now."

Alex grunted and waved a dismissive hand toward the man. He shuffled into the kitchen, out of view of the bedroom door.

"Wait! Come back!" The man struggled against the handcuffs and swore viciously, but made no progress.

"Shut up," Alex growled. "I'll be in there in a minute." He grimaced as he poured a cup of coffee into a mug with the name SPLATTERCON printed on the side in drippy, scarlet lettering. It made him smile as he remembered his sister, Dana, buying the mug for him at the horror film festival so long ago. It was the only mug he ever used for coffee. He took a sip, savored the scalding liquid and then sighed as he walked toward the bedroom.

"Who are you?" the man asked the second he stepped into the doorway. The anger had bled from his voice, but he was no less insistent when he said, "Tell me where I am." He eyed Alex, his expression full of indignation, but he seemed more cautious now than anything.

Alex remained silent for a moment, taking this time to examine the stranger. The man could have been anywhere between thirty and forty years old, probably leaning farther toward forty with the sheer amount of scars that crisscrossed along his olive-toned skin. He had fine features that reminded Alex of the actors big movie producers hired to play Sultans and Sikhs in Hollywood. His eyes were hazel, though they gleamed nearly golden in the light that filtered in through the thin curtains over the bedroom window. "Name's Zeus," Alex finally said, smirking as he addressed himself by the codename the military had given him. "Don't see why you need to know any more than that." He took a sip of his coffee and leaned against the doorframe. "You're in Manhattan."

Frowning, Altaїr repeated the name, working it over on his tongue like a new flavor. "I am unfamiliar with this name." He glanced toward the window and then shifted uncomfortably on the bed. His arms were held out wide, stretched as far as they could go by the handcuffs. "Am I still in the Holy Lands?" he asked, wincing when he rolled his shoulder.

Alex frowned and tilted his head slightly. What was this guy on? And where could he get some? "Buddy, I think you've been on the pipe a bit too long," he said. "This is Manhattan, New York. As in the USA."

"USA?" the man repeated. "What is that?" He grimaced and shook his head. "Never mind, it's not important. You must untie me."

The hooded man raised his mug and sipped at length, making a pleased sound. "Nope," he said. "Not gonna."

"Why are you holding me prisoner?" the stranger demanded, his voice rising. He closed his eyes, took a breath and mastered his temper. After a moment, he looked up at Alex, his face set in a stony expression. "What do you want from me?"

"Prisoner," Alex chuckled. He swirled the coffee around the bottom of the mug and said, "I found you sprawled in the middle of an alley naked as a newborn baby and unconscious. If I hadn't saved your ass, you'd probably be dead by now. Or infected. Whichever you think is worse, I guess."

"And do you expect compensation for your troubles?" the stranger asked, his mouth twisting into a bitter grimace. "I have no money, nor anything to trade."

"Nah, you don't have anything I want," Alex said. He studied the man for a moment, wondering if that statement was true. Then he shrugged lazily and pulled the golden sphere he'd taken from the man from his pocket. He'd used a wet rag to clean the soot off and was disappointed that it looked dull in the light, less impressive than he'd hoped. "I'm more interested in where you found this." He tossed it in the air and caught it, raising a brow when the other man strained against the handcuffs.

"Be careful with that!" he shouted, kicking his legs in frustration. "Don't toss it around so carelessly!"

Alex caught the orb again and tapped a fingernail against its cold, metal surface. "Why, is it valuable?" he asked.

The man's eyes narrowed and his voice became guarded when he said, "It is of no value to you. Only to those who would seek it for knowledge."

Alex studied the other for a long moment, then examined the orb. "Even with all the scratches and dents, this would fetch a hefty price. I think I'll sell it." He didn't smile, despite feeling fairly cheeky about this whole situation. It had been far too long since he'd had real interaction with another person. "Should prove interesting." Then he turned away.

"No!" the man snarled, genuine rage making his arms tremble, and the metal handcuffs groan in protest against the strain he was putting on them. "Give me the Apple! It belongs to me!"

Alex paused mid-step and turned his head to listen. "The Apple?" he asked. "The Apple? As in the Apple of Eden?"

The stranger froze. "How do you know that name?" he breathed. His voice sounded strained, as if he couldn't decide to feel anger, petulance or bitterness. "Are you a Templar come to kill me?"

Alex remained silent for a moment, weighing his options. Kill this nutbag and go about his usual, boring day of consuming his targets and avoiding trigger-happy, grenade-launcher-carrying sociopaths? Or screw with him and see where it went?

"Say that I am," Alex drawled, turning back to face the room. "What then?"

The other man snorted distastefully and looked away from Alex, unimpressed. "You're no Templar agent. You would have killed me already if you were. Why wait until I wake? I'm one of the Knights Templar's most formidable adversaries. You would have to be a fool to let me live this long."

It was Alex's turn to snort. "You're pretty full of yourself," he laughed. "But how's your bite? Or are you all talk?"

The man bristled and his hands clenched into tight fists. "I would demonstrate, but as you can see, I've been restrained."

"Mm, don't forget you're naked under that towel," Alex added around the last of his coffee. He flashed a grin, winked and said, "Can't forget the naked part."

The stranger's brow twitched in irritation and he flicked one of his wrists, rattling the short links between the handcuffs. "If you would release me," he seethed, "I would be able to find some clothing."

Alex rolled his eyes and walked out of the room to refill his mug. He heard the man mutter, "I'll kill you if I must."

"Unlikely," he called from the kitchen and he waggled a finger at the bedroom door for emphasis. "But, it's good that you're willing to try. 'Don't give up,' 'keep looking on the bright side,' 'silver linings' and such. Valiant effort, really."

The man sighed in irritation and said, "I have no idea what you're talking about. I have no time to listen to your prattling! I must return home!" The handcuffs clacked noisily against the metal bed frame and he growled in frustration. "My people need me. We're on the brink of war, damn you!"

"War?" Alex echoed, grimacing when scalding coffee splashed onto his hand and burned his skin. It healed before he'd even licked the coffee off. "What war?"

The man sighed again and enunciated carefully, as if he was speaking to a particularly slow child. "I was supposed to speak to a Rafik in Jerusalem before all of...this...happened."

"And what exactly is 'all of this?' " Alex called. "Do you know how you ended up in an alleyway with your ass hanging out halfway across the world from where you're supposed to be?"

"Halfway across the..." The man's voice trailed off and he was quite for so long Alex thought he'd passed out again. Much to Alex's disappointment—or was it delight? This man was certainly the most interesting thing in his life right now, also the least deadly—he said, "The Apple. It...must have transported me here. Boy, quickly. What year is it? Tell me!"

Alex walked back to the doorway and sipped his coffee slowly, enjoying watching the other man squirm as he took his time. "It's twenty-twelve," he said. "Why is that important?"

The stranger's brows tried to become one with his hair and he shook his head. "No, no no no, that can't be right," he breathed. His eyes flicked around the room, unfocused as if he was keeping track of calculations. He seemed to come to a conclusion, because the utter despair in his eyes and the little 'o' his mouth formed made Alex actually feel bad for the guy. "Over eight hundred years," he whispered. "Eight hundred years...and I haven't the slightest idea how to return." Tears filled his eyes and he pulled at the handcuffs hard enough to make his wrists bleed. "If you are lying to me, you are a dead man," he snarled, his voice hard and suddenly furious. "I swear by God himself, I will end you."

Alex studied the man for a long moment, then looked pointedly away, trying not to let his expression scream, 'This guy's crazy!' quite as loudly as he was thinking it.

"Time travel," the man muttered, his face screwing up as if he'd bitten into a lemon. "It's impossible!"

"Welcome to the twenty first century, where nothing makes sense, and everyone thinks they're right," Alex said sardonically. "Now, are you going to tell me what you're freaking out about? I mean don't get me wrong, I'll play twenty-questions, but it might go a bit faster if you just tell me."

The stranger glowered at Alex and bared his teeth in a hiss of pain when he pulled at one of the handcuffs again. "My name is Altaїr Ibn-La'Ahad, and I am from the year eleven-ninety one. Something has happened that has sent me here to your time and I suspect it has been caused by what you hold in your hand." He paused to lick his lips nervously and continued, "That artifact could very well be my only way back to my own time, and I need it back. Please, release me. I need to return to my own time so I can lead my assassins into war."

"Assassins, huh?" Alex asked, pursing his lips. "Interesting. Gimme a few. I'm dying for a hot dog. You want anything?" He gave Altaїr a minute, but he just spent it glowering. "No? Good. Sleep tight pretty boy."

"Insufferable child!" Altaїr shouted after him.

 

Alex did not walk down the streets of Manhattan proper. He strode. He practically swaggered. Anyone who could have identified him was either dead or gone, and he could hide in plain sight if the military decided to pose an issue. While Manhattan's inhabitants were trying to live with the crippling infection that plagued the city, Alex spent his days waiting for the bridges to open. He'd hit a dead end in the investigation of his past, and while he waited impatiently for new information to surface, he walked the streets and observed the destruction the infection had wrought. Countless buildings were destroyed by massive, living, pulsing vines that weaved in and out of windows and brick alike, giving off a feverish warmth and a distinct stench that made Alex's eyes smart when he walked past them. Death unlike anything humanity had suffered before had rained down upon these poor souls, and yet Alex felt no sympathy for them. No one had ever even batted an eye at him. They'd damned themselves to this plague, and it would snuff out the weak, leaving the strong to deal with him.

Prowling down the rubble-strewn sidewalks of one of the infected neighborhoods, Alex found himself face-to-face with one of the infected. The creature's eyes were red and unfocused, its shoulders were bubbled up in masses of hideous pink flesh that pulsed with its heartbeat. It skittered to a halt, chittering in its alien screeches. When it turned its face toward Alex, he could see that its skin was melted, as if someone had poured acid over its face and let it heal that way.

He watched the infected man advance a step, and then a few more before it fell into a dead sprint, its head bowed and its arms flailing to help propel it forward. Alex rolled his eyes and flexed his arm so black and red biomass writhed along the limb and formed a long, flat blade. Its edge gleamed in the weird red glow from the buildings around them and he slashed vertically at the infected man when he came within striking distance. He side-stepped quickly to avoid the gore and ichor that spewed from the creature's belly, and he made a disgusted sound.

"Vermin, the lot of them," Alex muttered, flexing his arm again so it returned to its normal shape. He slipped his hands into his pockets and continued down the street, humming faintly under his breath. Before long, he reached one of the refugee camps where the uninfected had pooled during the first few days of the infection. Several restaurants were still open for business, though they worked off of wood-burning stoves now instead of electric.

"Getcha hot dawgs hea'!" a Brooklyn accented voice shouted above the din. Men, women and children crowded the courtyard, and all of them seemed to have something to say. The sound was dizzying, making the world tilt as Alex placed a hand over his ear to block out the man's voice. He grimaced and kept his head down as he stepped into the line. There was no sense in causing a fight here, not when he'd have to expend so much effort to get out of there unmolested.

"Four hot dogs," he said when he finally reached the counter.

"Fixins an' all?" the rotund man asked. He must be eating more of his wares than he's selling to be that fat, Alex thought bitterly. Everyone else is starving while he stuffs his fat face. He thought of his sister, Dana, and felt an unfamiliar anger burn in his chest. If not for the memory of his sister's thin form, he wouldn't have given a damn.

"Yes," he said, crossing his arms over his chest.

The vender paused and then set his hands on his hips, his sausage-like fingers drumming against his stained jeans. "Show me yer face, boy. I don' like the looks o' ya."

Alex lifted his head enough to show his eyes. He knew the effect the sickly gray glow of his eyes had on people, and he knew damn well that this man would be too stupid to heed a warning that wasn't slathered in bacon grease and outlined in neon signs. "Just get me my food, and we won't have a problem," he said, irritation gnawing at what little patience he possessed.

"Pffut! I don' haveta serve the likes o' you. I got 'undreds o' people 'ere lookin' to buy some hot dawgs. So git outta the way fer my payin' customers." He waved the next person up, but the man behind Alex stayed where he stood—smart man.

A smile spread on Alex's lips, though it didn't reach his eyes, and his voice was even pleasant when he said, "Give me what I ordered, or I will burn your shop to the ground."

"Right," the vender scoffed, though his eyes shifted around the ground as if he was looking for someone to back him up. Did they actually have a police presence in this shithole? "Like I haven't 'eard tha' one before. Move ova'."

Alex's patience snapped and he lunged forward, grabbed the man's sweaty white shirt collar and pulled him across the counter so that his large belly propped him up. "I'm only going to ask one more time that you give me my food, and then I'm going to redecorate your shop with whatever I pull out of your meaty little body. I might even let you die before I start, though I'd rather have your opinion on the paint job before I say goodbye."

The vendor's eyes widened, and he began sweating bullets. The stench of fear rolled off of him, and he held his hands up in surrender. "'Ey, man, I'm jus' tryin' to make a livin' here. L-l-lemme go, and I'll getcha yer order. Hell, I'll double it, and you can have it f-free!"

Alex held the man for another long moment, then released him and flicked his hands in distaste, wiping the sweat from them on a bystander's shirt. "That's all I wanted," he said calmly. With just a little effort, he'd proclaimed his intentions and scared the majority of the crowd around him. How'd he know? There was suddenly a seven foot-wide circle of clear space around him when only moments before, there'd hardly been enough room to breathe.

In the time it took Alex to hum Frere Jacques, the vendor had placed a white plastic bag with several tin-foil wrapped bundles in it on the counter. Alex set a ten on the counter, took the hotdogs with a nod and waded through the crowd, grinning as people who hadn't even witnessed his violence stepped back from him. It was nice to be respected, better still to be feared. No one fucked with you when they knew you could fuck them up right back.

It didn't take long to walk home, and when he did, he locked the door behind him and set the bag on the kitchen table and removed one of the hotdogs. He hadn't even unwrapped it when he dropped the dog on the table and whirled, bringing his biomass blade up in a defensive X with his other arm, meeting the sweeping arch of the kitchen blade with perturbed deference. He hadn't even heard the bastard moving.

Altaїr, who had appraised Alex's apartment of a pair of jeans, snarled in rage and drew the chef's knife back for another strike. Alex reached out, caught the man's wrist and twisted his arm behind his back. He grimaced and squeezed the man's wrist until his bones groaned when the assassin tried to writhe in a snake-like movement that would have broken the hold. Altaїr collapsed to his knees in pain and Alex twisted the arm up behind his back, holding it right at the edge where another ounce of pressure would break his arm in several places.

"Pretty light on your feet there, eh Twinkle Toes?" Alex sneered.

"My name is—"

"Altaїr Ibn'La blah blah blah. Yes, I know." He frowned in distaste at the ragged, pained breaths the man was taking and he rolled his eyes. "God, you're a pussy." He shook his head and released Altaїr, watching as the assassin collapsed onto the floor and nursed his arm. "I'm not going to hand feed you, but if you try to run again, I'll break you in so many places, that'll be the only way you'll be able to eat. Am I understood?"

Altaїr glowered up at him from the floor with unabashed, naked hatred in his eyes. "Understood."

"Good," Alex said cheerfully. He walked back across the room and pulled another hot dog out of the bag, setting it in front of the seat on the other side of the table. "Eat." He devoured a hot dog himself, and then another. He didn't need the food to survive, but damn if there wasn't anything better than a New York hot dog. His stomach agreed with him as he slowly chewed the last bite of his third hot dog.

Altaїr had just picked himself up off the floor when Alex finished eating and the assassin walked over to the kitchenette, taking the seat Alex gestured to.

"What is this?" the assassin asked, opening the tin-foil package and poking the bun.

"It's a hot dog," Alex said through another mouthful of the same.

"It is dog?" Altaїr asked. Then his nose screwed up and he sneered in contempt. "So you are a savage."

"No," Alex said, rolling his eyes. "It's all the unmentionable parts of the animals we slaughter blended up into a sausage-like...thing. Just eat it. It's good, trust me."

Altaїr gave Alex a bland look.

"I didn't poison it," Alex said defensively, taking another bite of his fourth hot dog. "Though I can't promise that vendor didn't spit on it—I'm kidding!" He popped the last bite of his food into his mouth and said, "You're really testy, you know that, guy?"

"Perhaps I would be less so if you hadn't chained me to a bed and left me naked and vulnerable in the middle of hostile territory," the assassin muttered as he picked up the parcel.

"Sheesh," Alex said, studying Altaїr as the other man sniffed the hot dog disdainfully. "If you don't want yours, I'll take it and you can starve. It's the only edible thing in the apartment, so you either stuff it and eat the damn thing or starve."

Altaїr glared at the man, but his stomach gurgled in obvious protest of his pride. He looked down at the onions, peppers and other deliciousness as if it was going to try to bite him back. Then, with no small amount of theatrics, he took the smallest bite he could while still getting a little of everything. And it promptly spilled all of its contents down the assassin's naked chest in true New York cuisine style.

Altaїr set the hot dog down and grimaced as he cleaned himself up. He glanced at Alex and then glared at the hot dog. "It's good," he admitted glumly. He picked it up again, being more careful to keep the bun closed as he took another bite.

Alex studied the assassin, unsure whether to be amused or disgusted. "That's New York for ya," he said as he stood. He walked to the refrigerator, two of the remaining hot dogs in the fridge. He emerged with two cold beers and offered a bottle to Altaїr, who took it with a look of puzzlement.

Watching a grown man struggle with a beer bottle was probably the most amusing thing Alex had seen in weeks. He crossed his arms over his chest and grinned when Altaїr set the bottle on the table with a look of frustration on his face. "Are you going to help me, or just laugh?" he growled.

"Why not both?" Alex mused. He reached forward and, just to be mean, set his hand on top of the bottle's lid and consumed the cap with a minor effort of will.

Altaїr blinked and looked at the bottle, turning it around to try and figure out what had just happened. He picked it up, glared suspiciously at Alex and then sniffed the brew surreptitiously. "What kind of wine is this?" he asked.

"It's not wine," Alex said, opening his own bottle the same way. "It's beer. Finest drink there is, if you ask me." He took a swig of the beer and reclined in his seat. "So. You gonna tell me how you happened upon the Apple of Eden? Or should we start with how you got out of the handcuffs? Those were police-issue cuffs. Not easy to slip out of."

"There is no bond," Altaїr said before he took another bite of his hot dog, "from which an assassin of my rank cannot escape. If we couldn't," again, another bite, "we wouldn't be a very good order of assassins, now would we?"

"We," Alex said. "You keep saying we. Who is 'we?' "

"We are the order of assassins sworn to protect the Holy Lands and all she supports from the Templar menace that encumbers the advancement of the human race," Altaїr said, finishing his hot dog. A sour look crossed his face, and he turned his face away as he belched. "I feel ill," he commented.

"That's called heart burn," Alex said dismissively. "Drink more beer. What war are you talking about? Why are you fighting? And who are you fighting?"

Altaїr eyed Alex warily, but he must have deemed his questions safe to answer, at least in part. "The why is more simple than the whom. We fight because it is right. We fight for the freedom of the people from the tyrannical slavery that the Knights Templar would rain down upon us. We fight because each and every one of us has a purpose, a reason to fight, and a reason to die. Who we fight is more of a mystery. Templars have their eyes and ears everywhere, and I fear some may have even infiltrated my own Order."

"I asked for an answer, not a history lesson," Alex muttered. Then he sighed and asked, "Who makes up your order? Do you hold auditions or something to see who can kill the best?"

"Don't be preposterous," Altaїr snapped, obviously offended. "We accept men and women who seek vengeance for the atrocities caused by the Templars, and those who wish to appease their sins, whatever those sins may be."

"How do you keep that going? Don't you worry they'll rise up and try to overthrow you?" Why he was so interested in this man was beyond Alex, but the questions kept coming, so he kept asking.

"We have three tenets, or rules if you will. The first, stay your blade from the flesh of an innocent. This law dictates that one shall not kill unless the target deserves his death. Second, hide in plain sight. And the third, never compromise the Brotherhood." Altaїr's eyes darkened. "The consequences for deserting these tenets are...dire."

Alex absorbed this information and nodded, impressed. "And here I thought I was special," he said with a smirk. "I'm something of a lab rat, tested on and sent out to destroy the world."

"That sounds like quite a burden," Altaїr commented, his expression unreadable. "If your task is to destroy the world, and you seem to be efficient enough to incapacitate me, I have to wonder. Why is the world still here?"

Alex considered that for a long moment and watched a drop of condensation slide down the bottle he held. "I don't know, really," he said thoughtfully. "I guess I've just decided the world should have a second chance. They don't deserve it, but I think I should know why I'm meant to destroy them before I actually do it. For now, the world can stay as it is."

For now, a voice in the back of his head whispered.


	3. Seed of Doubt

"So," Altaїr said, walking across the living room to sit on the couch. "You have asked me all of these questions, but I have asked none for myself. Who are you?"

Alex followed him and sat perched on the opposite arm of the couch, his feet on the cushion. "I told you, the name's Zeus."

The assassin raised a skeptical brow. "Do you not have a surname? Do you not have a father?"

Alex's expression hardened and he looked away. "I have a last name. I don't remember my father. I don't know much about myself. I really only know what those who knew me before do."

"Before what?" Altaїr pressed. He watched the other man sift through the possible answers he could give before settling on one.

"Nunya beeswax," he sighed. "Now, are those my pants?"

Altaїr held Alex's gaze for a moment, his expression disapproving. Then he rolled his eyes and looked down at the jeans he wore. "I assume so. I found them in that wooden box in the other room."

"My dresser, you mean," Alex said, flopping down on the loveseat and crossing his ankles on the coffee table

"If that is what it is called, then yes." The assassin looked around the room and frowned. Everything was so different from home. There were strange fixtures in the ceiling, hard material like ceramic in the windows, though it was transparent like water. And the furniture was so uncomfortable...how did anyone sleep on them without pillows? "What is that?" he asked, gesturing to the television just to focus his confusion on one thing. Thinking about the foreign world around him made his head hurt.

"It's called a television. You watch stuff on it," Alex answered. To demonstrate, he picked up a black rectangle and pressed something on it. Immediately, a woman's face appeared on the screen. She was pretty, with sharp features and long, blood-red hair that fell around her shoulders in stunning curls.

"How does it work?" Altaїr demanded, rising from the couch and walking toward the box. He reached out tentatively and touched it, afraid it would harm him. He grimaced when his fingertips touched cold, hard material and he looked over at Alex, who was snickering. "Is it magic?"

"What year did you say you were from?"

"Eleven ninety-one," Altaїr responded, still bewildered by the little people speaking on the screen.

"Ah. TV's weren't even a glimmer in Philo Farnsworth's great grandfather's, grandfather's eye."

"Who?"

"Nevermind," Alex sighed. "Come on. You need a shirt. I don't want some half naked dude running around my apartment." He stood up from the couch and padded toward his room, flicking the television off as he went, which made Altaїr flinch in surprise. "Hurry up."

Altaїr grimaced at him but followed, muttering under his breath about being ordered around by a commoner. When he entered the room behind Alex, a piece of cloth assaulted his face, and he struggled with it for a moment before snatching it up and holding it aloft. A picture of a black and white creature with enormous eyes looked back at him, and he frowned. A bear? He'd seen a few bears in his travels, but never any with this coloring. "What is this?" he asked.

"A shirt. It's the only thing I have. It was my sister's, but it was too big for her. It should fit you," Alex called from inside his closet.

While Altaїr was struggling into the shirt, a pair of shoes came soaring out of the closet, and he ducked, missing one, but taking the other full in the chest. He grunted in surprise and annoyance, but picked them up. "Must you throw things at me?" he asked.

"Yup," Alex said, brushing his hands on his jeans as he kicked the closet door shut.

"Barbarian," Altaїr muttered, sitting on the bed. He frowned at the unlaced shoes and quickly weaved the laces in. "These shoes are impractical," he said. "They will make too much noise as I walk."

"Well, they're all I've got, so if you'd rather go bare foot, you're more than welcome to."

Altaїr leveled a glower at Alex and stuck his feet in the shoes, tying them off quickly. "Are we going somewhere?" he asked. He glanced toward a mirror in the corner of the room and grimaced. The shirt was extremely tight against his frame, and although it defined the muscles of his arms and chest well, it was very feminine. He didn't like it at all.

"Nope. I just prefer that you actually wear clothing," Alex said as he left the room.

The assassin followed him, a sour look on his face as he realized he was following his captor around like a lost puppy. Or worse, like a slave. "I suppose I'm not allowed to leave this building?" he said blandly. "Am I allowed to go out on my own?"

"Oh, you're more than welcome to leave, but you wouldn't last five minutes out there."

That struck a chord in some defensive place in a dark corner of Altaїr's mind, and his mouth twisted into a sour grimace. "I've faced worse than anything this time has to offer."

"Ha!" Alex crowed. "Oh, that's cute." He pulled another beer from the fridge and flicked the lid off, taking a long pull. "Go ahead. It'll be interesting to see how long it takes you to kick the bucket."

"I will not be kicking any buckets," Altaїr growled.

"Oh my god," Alex muttered, rubbing his face. "You're worse than a five year-old." He sighed loudly and gestured toward the living room. "I want to sleep. Just watch TV or something and stay out of my hair for a while."

A flicker of confusion cooled Altaїr's anger to frustration and he muttered mutinously under his breath.

Alex picked up the black rectangle he'd used before to control the television and held it out to Altaїr. "This is a remote. The red button turns it on and off, the buttons with arrows on them change the channel and turn the volume up and down. Go nuts." He tossed the remote to the assassin and then walked into his room, kicking the door closed behind him.

The second Alex was out of sight, Altaїr tossed the remote aside and strode to the front door. He unlocked the deadbolt, flung the door open, stepped out into the hallway and sucked in a surprised breath through clenched teeth. A monster stood at the end of the hall, maybe twenty feet away. It crouched on two legs, but looked nothing like something that could be considered human. Grotesque muscle was piled atop one of its shoulders, oozing blood, pus and worse, and its face was twisted into a bulbous mound of flesh. Yellow foam bubbled at the blackened corner of its mouth, dripping onto the ground as it turned to face Altaїr. Its jaws parted, and it bellowed a horrifying screech.

Altaїr slammed the door shut and threw the deadbolt, sprinting across the room and vaulting over the back of one of the couches. He crashed onto the floor and laid there for a long moment. He was  _not_  cowering, he was taking cover. Completely different from cowering.

There was a loud crash, and Altaїr flinched, covering his head as he waited for the monster to attack him. He laid there for what seemed like decades, his heart thundering in his ears and deafening him to the world. His muscles started to ache from being coiled for so long and he slowly released the tension, sitting up and looking around. Alex stood in front of him, a grin slowly spreading over his lips. Then he shook his head, covered his mouth and started laughing.

"What was that?" Altaїr breathed.

"The look on your face," Alex snickered, "oh God, it's precious."

Altaїr bared his teeth, trying to ignore the warmth that spread over his cheeks and the tips of his ears. "Only children laugh at those with the good sense to be cautious."

"Then I'm a fucking toddler!" Alex laughed. He wiped away a tear and sighed in satisfaction. "No but really, don't open the door without me here. You'll get very dead very fast if any more infected make it up this high." He frowned and looked over at the door. "They usually don't make it this far." He shrugged and looked back over at Altaїr, smirking.

"I don't need you looking after me," the assassin snapped as he came to his feet. Despite his bravado, he glanced at the door, keeping his limbs loose in case he needed to run again.

"Apparently you do," Alex snapped right back, his patience wearing thin. He picked up the remote, turned the TV on and flipped to a random channel. "Hey, look at that. Tom and Jerry. Sit down, watch the show, and keep your mouth shut. It's hard to sleep past your whimpering."

Altaїr's hands clenched into fists and he had to resist the very real temptation to beat Alex's face into pulp. He held his tongue long enough for the other man to walk into the bedroom before he snarled a string of curses under his breath, unable to completely suppress his anger. He spent a long moment pacing the living room and muttering to himself. When his frustration was spent, he sank onto the couch and stared mindlessly at the television.

After a moment, the assassin frowned as he watched the characters, slowly understanding that one was supposed to be a cat and the other a mouse. He grimaced as they chased each other, using ridiculous tools to try and maim one another.

"That's a terrible tactic," he said. "That hammer is much too heavy, he could never..." His eyes narrowed as the mouse slammed the hammer into the cat's foot and he leaned forward, intrigued by the lack of logic. It didn't take long for the cartoon to enthrall him.

The bedroom door opened sharply, and Alex stepped into the living room, his eyes narrowed and his hands curled into fists.

"Run, little mouse! Do not let the cat take you alive! Fight him! Use the...no! Don't go into the wall, that's a terrible hiding place!"

Alex strode toward the couch, snatched up the remote and shut the television off. "No more TV for you," he growled.

"But the cat was about to—"

"I don't care what the damn cat was about to do!" Alex snarled. "I don't get to just sit around very often, and I'd like to spend this time sleeping for once. And you acting like a fucking cartoon is a football game is keeping me up. So shut your mouth and do something quiet!" He opened the back of the remote, removed two little silver tubes from it and chucked them across the room.

"What would you have me do?" Altaїr asked, his voice bland.

"Fucking sleep or something, I don't care. Just don't wake me up again."

Altaїr rolled his eyes and glanced sullenly at the television after Alex slammed his door shut again. He'd wanted to see the end of the cartoon, but it wasn't important. None of this was. He needed to find a way home, and sitting around wasn't going to get that done.

He glanced at the front door and shuddered when he remembered the slavering jaws and glowing red eyes of the beast outside. He closed his eyes, sighed in frustration and laid on the couch, hugging his knees to fit on the slender cushions. He found sleep hard to come by, and when he finally managed to drift off, his sleep was uneasy and filled with nightmares. He dreamt of the Apple, of the visions it gave him, and of the life he had left behind.

 

 _"_   _Altaїr," Maria whispered, her soft, warm lips touching his ear. "Why did you leave me?"_

_Altaїr pulled back just enough to meet his wife's eyes, but still held her close. "I'm so sorry," he said. Tears filled his eyes, blurring his vision as he cupped her cheek in his hand. "I want to return to you...the Apple is out of my reach. I cannot go home without it. I miss you so..."_

_"I need you," Maria breathed. She placed her hand over his, turning her face into his palm. "The Templars are winning the war without you. I've joined the fight." She closed her eyes and her lip trembled. "_ _Altaїr...I'm with child."_

_Overwhelming joy washed over_ _Altaїr and he smiled widely. "This is wonderful news," he said, hugging her tightly. His smile faltered as grief pierced the warmth of his elation like an icy spear. His wife was with child, and where was he?_

_Maria's arms wrapped around his neck and she nuzzled her face into his chest. She started to speak, but her voice broke and she gasped, letting out a quiet, pained whimper. "Come back to me, my love," she whispered. "Come..." She coughed wetly, and_ _Altaїr_   _stumbled forward a step when she leaned into him, suddenly boneless._

_Altaїr knelt with his wife, his eyes wide, his mouth working in confusion. A foot of bloody steel was speared through her chest, piercing her heart. The angle must have severed her spine, because the tip of the sword was chipped, as if it had struck bone._

_"No," Altaїr whispered. His trembling hand hovered over the horrendous wound and he drew a choked breath. "Maria, no!" He tore off his tunic, bunching it around the blade as he started crying. He moved his hand to Maria's pale cheek and he shook his head. "No, no, no..." He lifted her, jerking back in revulsion as her head rolled bonelessly to the side._

_"Maria!" he keened, gripping her bloody tunic as the stain spread over her chest. "I'll come home...I'll come home right now!" He touched her face again, felt the coldness of her cheek under his fingers, the chill of her lips as he leaned down to kiss her. "Please," he sobbed, "don't die."_

_He clung to her still body as he wept and screamed, "_ MARIA _!"_

 

Altaїr surged up off the couch, blinded by the darkness of the room around him, and he cried out, staggering over the coffee table. He collapsed to the floor, curling on his side with his arms crossed over his chest. His keening cries pierced the silence, echoing off the empty walls. He didn't notice the bedroom door open, but when Alex's hand touched his arm, he rolled into a defensive crouch and shrieked, " _Get away from her!_ "

Alex knelt there on the ground, wide-eyed and nervous. He grimaced and glanced around the room, looking for what could have upset the assassin. "What's wrong? Are you hurt?"

As the reality of the dream faded, it left Altaїr with the distinct feeling that something was missing. He fell onto his ass and held his empty hands out in front of him. He stared down at them as tears blurred his vision and he shook his head, clutching his hands to his chest again.

"She's gone," he whispered. "She's dead...she's  _dead_!

"Who is?" Alex demanded. He swept the room again and edged closer to the assassin. "Dammit, what's going on?"

Altaїr covered his face with his hands and wiped away his tears frantically. "I have to go home," he panted. "I have to go back, I can't be here. She's in danger, she's with child...God, if anything happens to her..." His lip trembled as he remembered the weight of his wife's limp body in his arms and he clenched his teeth. "I need the Apple."

"Now just hold on a minute...who's 'she?' What's going on? Are you hurt?" There was no concern in the man's voice, only irritated confusion. He didn't care what happened to Maria, he didn't care that she could be hurt or worse, and Altaїr was sitting there on his ass doing nothing!

"My wife," he croaked. "I h-had a dream. She's hurt, Zeus. I have to go home, she  _needs_  me." He met the other man's eyes and whispered, "Please. I'm begging you."

Alex shifted to balance on the balls of his feet and then he sighed, hanging his head. "Look, man, I don't know what this is. Dreams are just dreams, alright? You're not some kind of fortune teller or some shit—are you?"

"Of course not," Altaїr snapped. He wiped the tears from his face with the collar of his shirt and looked down at the floor. His body ached with grief and he wanted nothing more than to lay down and die. Dream or not, the thought of his wife dying was an agony he could never have prepared for. "If there's even a chance that my dream has any truth to it, I must return home," he said. His words were quiet and hard, like the coldness of his eyes. "Please."

Alex studied him and then sighed, pushing his hood back and running his fingers through his curly hair. "Fine. It's not like I've got any reason to keep you here." He stood and walked to the bedroom.

Altaїr waited there on the floor, only moving to lean his back against the couch so he could pull his knees up to his chest and hug them. It was a comforting posture, one that reminded him of quiet nights he'd spent as a child hiding and watching the stars in the haylofts of Masyaf's horse stables. He closed his eyes and tried to push the images of Maria's lifeless gaze from his mind, tried to forget the eerie warmth of her blood on his fingers.

The soft sound of Alex's bare feet on the carpet distracted Altaїr from his grief for the briefest of moments. He looked up at the man through tearful eyes and felt his hope dissolve into the aching of his heart when he saw the Apple in Alex's hand. He held his hand out and took the artifact when it was offered to him, and he closed his eyes again, holding it in both hands. The metal was cold under his fingers, cold, and lifeless, and dead, not unlike Maria's skin.

"Well?" Alex asked expectantly. "Anything?"

"Nothing," Altaїr whispered. "There's nothing." Anger swelled in his chest, filling his limbs with tingling energy that made him want to run and scream and kill all at the same time. He hauled his arm back and flung the Apple across the room, screaming in rage as it crashed into the apartment wall, leaving a dent the size of his fist in the drywall. Altaїr gripped his hair and gritted his teeth as he sobbed. He didn't know how long he stayed there, but when he felt a gentle hand on his arm and lifted his head, it was still night and the only source of light filtered in through the apartment's single window, harsh and yellow.

"Look," Alex said quietly, and his voice was surprisingly gentle. "You're having a tough time. I get it. I do. But..." He was crouched in front of Altaїr again, his expression tight with barely veiled confusion and more than a little frustration. "I'm not good with this touchy-feely shit. Just...here." He produced a paper bag from inside his jacket and held it out to the assassin.

"What is it?"

"It's happy juice," Alex said blandly, "the hell does it matter? It'll help take the edge off of...whatever  _this_  is, and it'll help you sleep without waking me up every twenty minutes."

Altaїr took the bag and was surprised to feel a bottle inside of it. He pulled the bottle out and grimaced at the label. "Scotch," he read. "What is that?"

"It's alcohol. Don't drink too much or you'll probably kill yourself." Alex pulled a small glass out of the same pocket and held it out to him. "I recommend five or six of these, only half full. That's what used to do it for me. Don't touch the door and stay out of my room." He started to stand, but Altaїr reached out and grabbed his wrist, holding him there.

"The Apple," he croaked. His throat hurt from his screaming, and he had to swallow several times before he could ask, "Where will you put it?"

Alex eyed him, specifically looking at the hand on his wrist. "Somewhere safe," he said. "Just have your drinks and stay inside."

Altaїr lowered his gaze and examined the bottle. He looked up to ask why Alex was giving him a gift, but the bedroom door closed as he started to speak. He set his jaw and laid the bottle on the floor, scrubbing his face with his hands. He was exhausted, but every time he closed his eyes, he saw Maria lying on the ground with that wretched sword rammed through her chest. She stared at him blindly, her gaze as horrified as it was accusing. Why had he left her? Why had he gone away without a word?

"God," Altaїr whispered. He covered his eyes, rubbing them with the heels of his palms until they ached, and bright silver stars filled his vision.

When he opened his eyes, he picked up the bottle and the glass and came to his feet, walking toward the kitchen table. He set the glass down, twisted the bottle cap open—with only a little difficulty this time—and poured until the glass was filled to the brim. He sniffed it, flinched at the strong scent and then swallowed a mouthful, gnashing his teeth and coughing as it burned his throat. It was foul, far too strong to be enjoyed, but the warmth that tingled down his arms and legs gave him the will to suffer the taste. He drank the rest of the glass he'd poured and sat heavily at the table as his body settled into a pleasant numbness.

It didn't take long for the alcohol to reach his head, and by his second glass of the scotch, a warm fog had settled over his thoughts, making it hard to string together any intelligible ideas. Even the images that surfaced in his mind were blurred and inconsistent, mostly full of vague shapes and half-remembered details.

By the fourth glass, he had only half of the bottle left, and when he tried to read the label, the letters no longer formed words. He blinked repeatedly, but soon lost interest in discerning their meaning. He finished off what he'd poured and licked his lips, trying to understand why his tongue felt like lead. His eyes narrowed and he looked around the room. Why was it dark...where was...why was the bedroom door closed? He tried to finish the thoughts, but they were incredibly uninteresting. They rested on the surface of his tired mind, but didn't seem important enough to entertain.

The bottle rattled loudly as Altaїr tried to stand and knocked his knee into the tabletop. He steadied himself with one hand on the booth seat and the other on the table. When the floor stopped tilting this way and that, he stood and wobbled toward the front door. Somewhere in the back of his head, a small voice was grumbling about how undignified it was to stop mid-stride and fling his arms out to keep his balance, but he ignored the voice and took the fact that he was still even on his feet as a blessing and a minor miracle.

He tried to turn the doorknob, but the door wouldn't open. His fingers, which felt like slender sticks that were disconnected from his brain, fumbled at the metal deadbolt just above the doorknob, but he lost interest in it when he heard a cough from the other side of the apartment.

Altaїr turned toward the source of the noise and shambled across the living room, stopping just short of the closed bedroom door when the room performed a pirouette around him. He grimaced, leaned against the wall to the left of the door and slid down to the floor. He reached for the doorknob, missed, and stared at the floor instead. The carpet looked soft, but upon closer inspection, he realized it wasn't. His eyes burned with tears as he laid on his side in front of the door and stroked the disappointing carpet.

"It's not soft," he said quietly as he cried. "I thought it was...'s not soft, Maria. I wanted it to be soft."

The door opened behind him and he turned over onto his back to see Alex looking down at him with a perturbed expression on his face. He rolled his eyes and then closed the door with a muttered, "Ridiculous."

 

"I swear to God, Altaїr, if you keep me awake one more night, I'm going to slip you so many drugs, you'll wake up another eight hundred years in the future," Alex growled. Three days had passed since the incident with the scotch, and Alex hadn't slept a wink during them. He might not have needed sleep to keep his body alive, but his mind was exhausted beyond understanding. He had merely found Altaїr's nightmares annoying for the first night, but he was two seconds away from ripping the man's head off.

"My apologies," Altaїr said blandly, glaring at him, "I'll be sure to scold my subconscious for making me dream that my wife is being killed in a host of horrific ways. I'm sure it will recognize how rude it's being and keep it down from now on."

Alex returned the glare, pointing at the dark circles that had formed under his eyes. "These are because of you!" he said. In truth, they'd only formed because his body reacted the way he thought it should, a mind-over-matter kind of deal. He hadn't slept in days, and he thought that should logically equal dark circles under his eyes. It would be easy enough to will them away, but he felt he deserved being able to wallow in at least a little self-pity once in a while.

He muttered between bites of food that his life would be so much easier if he'd just left Altaїr in that alley.

"Then why didn't you?" Altaїr demanded, setting his fork down. He'd been picking at the Chinese food Alex had brought home, and he had the distinct feeling that Altaїr was judging the fact that it wasn't really 'Chinese'. "You could have left me there and gone on your way, so why didn't you?"

Thunder roared outside, shaking the windows and cutting off Alex's retort. He shot a nasty look at the ceiling and then pushed his food away in disgust. "I'm going to bed," he growled. He stood and then turned to face Altaїr, pointing a finger menacingly at him. "If you wake me up again, I'm going to tie you down and stuff a sock in your mouth."

Altaїr leveled a cool look at Alex and said, "I can't imagine that would be very effective. Or sanitary, for that matter."

Alex's lip curled in the beginnings of a snarl, but he just turned and stalked into his room.

Once he'd abandoned attempting to eat the noodles Alex had tried to pass for food, Altaїr took several beers from the fridge and drank them on the couch. He wasn't aiming to drink himself into a stupor like before—he would  _never_  drink that much again; nothing in the world was worth the headache he had woken up with—but he'd become dependent on beer to quiet his mind so he could sleep heavily enough not to remember his nightmares. Even with the alcohol, he still remembered most of them, if not the very worst.

Four beers later, Altaїr's eyelids drooped heavily and he drifted in and out of sleep. He snorted and jerked, waking up enough to look around the room and realize he wasn't in bed. Had he fallen asleep at his desk again? Where was the Apple?

The room was too dark for him to see, so he fumbled around, dropping the bottle he'd been holding in his haste. He slipped off the couch, falling onto his knees and resting his torso on the cushion. He fell asleep like that, only moving when he resurfaced and staggered to his feet. Maria would be upset if he spent all night in his study again. He stumbled across the room, grimacing when he bumped into furniture and walls that he didn't expect to be there. Where was his room? It should just be down the hall...

He reached out and flinched when his hand brushed a wall, and he followed it until he found a doorknob. He turned it with difficulty and stepped into the room, closing the door behind him. The covers were softer than he remembered when he slipped beneath them, and he scooted closer to Maria, glad to have someone to warm his chilled body.

"Goodnight," he mumbled as he slid his arm over her side and pulled her close.

Alex groaned softly and surfaced from a deep sleep just enough to be aware of the hand that pulled at him. He turned his head slightly and smiled, patting the arm that held him close. It wasn't uncommon for his sister to sleep in his bed, especially when she was in town for school and didn't feel like staying with her friends. Her warmth against his back was pleasant and welcome, and he let out a satisfied sigh as he fell asleep again, comforted by the knowledge that his little sister was safe.

Morning came all too soon, and Alex growled in frustration at the beam of sunlight that seemed to pierce right through his eyelids, directly to the pain-centers of his brain. He threw an arm over his face and froze when he felt a weight shift on his side. His eyes opened a crack, and he scanned what he could see of the room. There was no visible threat, though the gentle breath he felt on the back of his neck made him shudder in revulsion.

With a deft twist of his body, Alex leapt out of the bed, flexed his arm into the wicked claws he so enjoyed employing and...just stopped. He froze when he realized that the man laying in his bed was Altaїr. His expression twisted through a range of emotions, finally settling on exasperated indignation.

"What the  _fuck_  are you doing in my bed!" he shouted.

Altaїr flinched and grimaced as he opened his eyes. His arm cast out across the bed, feeling around the spot Alex had just vacated. "What?" he asked groggily. It took about a millisecond for the assassin to look up, see the anger in Alex's eyes, and realize just what was happening. "Oh...God."

"Yeah,  _oh God_. What the fuck are you doing?"

Altaїr stared at him, stunned into immobility not by where he had woken up, but rather by the black and red mass of his arm. Alex would admit, it was rather shocking to see the first time, but it just seemed unprofessional for a man to stare. Even a little rude.

"I sleep walk sometimes," Altaїr said quietly, keeping his voice calm and even in a tone most would reserve for speaking to rabid animals. "Ever since I began my studies with the Apple..."

"Oh, you sleep walk," Alex said genially. He smiled, relaxed his arm back into its normal shape and set his hands on his hips. "Well isn't that just dandy. You sleep walk, that's no big deal." His temper blazed as he leaned forward and snarled, "But into  _my_  bed? Get the fuck out of here!"

Altaїr glanced at the door, then held his hands out in a neutral I'm-not-armed gesture. He pulled the covers off his legs and then walked calmly, but briskly from the room, closing the door behind him. Once he was gone, Alex sighed emphatically and flopped back down onto his bed.

"God, it smells like him," he grumbled, turning over and slapping a pillow over his head. He squeezed his eyes shut, realized quickly that he wasn't going to be getting any more sleep, and just laid there for a long moment.  _Why is this happening to me?_ he thought miserably.  _What did I do to deserve this special kind of hell?_

 _Like you don't enjoy it,_  the voice in the back of his head whispered back.

"Shut up," Alex mumbled. "I don't need anything from the peanut gallery."

 _Very well,_ the voice said with no small amount of amusement in its words,  _I'll be here when you finally pull the stick out of your ass and start to realize it can be used for other things._

Alex choked on his breath as he tried to laugh, balk and snarl a curse all at the same time. He shook his head, clamped his arm down on the pillow over his face and wondered, for the first time, if he could suffocate. Maybe if he tried hard enough.


	4. Surprising Confrontation

With no small amount of anxiety, Altaїr watched Alex sip from his mug. It had only been a day since he'd walked into the other man's bed, and tensions were still high between the two of them. He looked down at the table and crossed his arms over his chest, clearing his throat softly. "I'm sorry for last nigh—"

"Suffice to say," Alex interrupted, "that the next time you try to cuddle with me, your mouth is going to become  _very_ familiar with your testicles." He drank from his mug again and met Altaїr's eyes. "Capisce?"

He eyed Alex for a long moment, then looked away from him. "It was not my intention to upset you," he said stonily. "Nor was it my intention to share a bed with you..."

"Naw, it never is," Alex drawled. He rolled his eyes and refilled his mug. The drink smelled amazing, much more appetizing than the beer or scotch Altaїr had been introduced to. It was dark and smelled rich, not unlike the coffee beans he'd seen shipped into ports and roasted in massive ovens. The beans had already been available to the masses, but he had to wonder if this drink was brewed from them.

"What is that?" Altaїr asked, hoping to change the subject.

Alex glanced at him and then looked at the mug he held. "It's called coffee."

"Is it made from the bean?"

"Yeah," Alex said blandly. "Didn't they have coffee in bumfuck-forever ago?"

"Of course. But we drank water like sensible human beings who live in a desert," Altaїr retorted in much the same tone. "Not hot bean water."

The corner of Alex's mouth tried to twitch into a smile, but was smothered in a grimace before it could get far. " _I'm_  the only one who gets to make wise cracks in this household," he said seriously. "Besides, your sense of humor is lacking."

"I haven't found much use for it. I've been busy leading one of the most formidable forces the Holy Lands have never heard of." He leveled a sour look on Alex and said, "I don't understand you. One minute you're furious with me, the next you're making jokes and speaking as if nothing has happened."

"I like to keep people guessing," Alex sneered.

"As I now see." Altaїr looked down at his hands, which rested on the tabletop. He wondered bitterly if he'd ever find his way home, if he'd ever see his love again. Would he ever be able to touch her again? To feel the softness of her skin, the gentleness of her touch? Grief threatened to overwhelm him, but he throttled the tears before they ever started to form in his eyes. "May I—"

A mug clunked down onto the table in front of him before he finished asking the question. He stared at the mug and raised a brow, looking up at Alex.

"You talk too much," Alex explained. He gestured to the drink. "It's good on its own, but if you like it with sugar, you're shit out of luck. This ain't a cafe."

Altaїr picked the mug up by its handle and held the lip to his nose, breathing the coffee's scent in deeply. It was earthy, sharp, a little bitter. What a lovely combination. It tasted even better than it smelled. "It's good," he said, setting the mug down. "Much smoother than I could make back home." He glanced at Alex and suppressed a wince as uncomfortable silence stretched between them.

When the silence seemed about to break, Alex sighed, "I'm out of here."

"What? Why?" Altaїr asked, rising as the other walked toward the door.

"Because of this," he said, gesturing between the two of them. "I don't like this awkwardness. So I'm out of here."

The door closed, and Altaїr stood there staring at it, trying to understand what had just happened. He shook his head to clear it, walked to the couch and then sat down. What the hell had he done? He hadn't even meant to do it, and he'd made such a huge blunder.

"I should apologize," he reasoned, speaking aloud just to fill the heavy silence. He rubbed his hand over his hair, muttering under his breath. Alex had taken him in—granted, for reasons unknown—and this was how Altaїr repaid his hospitality? He was being an incredibly ungracious guest...prisoner? What the hell was he? Even the thought of leaving the apartment and running into one of those monsters made him shudder, but he couldn't help but wonder if there was anything he could do to make up for the embarrassment he'd caused Alex.

"He hasn't exactly been kind to me," Altaїr argued, picking at a thread on the hem of the long shirt Alex had brought him. There was a large name printed on it, some kind of sport team according to Alex. Bat ball? Beebee hall? Something like that, it seemed ridiculous when Alex explained it. "Why should I do anything for him?"

"It's the right thing to do," he said. "I fell from the sky, and he took me in. According to him, he saved my life. I owe him. I don't have to do anything massive, but...dinner, maybe. I could get dinner so he doesn't have to."

It seemed a simple enough task, Alex brought home food every night and seemed nonplussed by whatever horrible creatures wandered around outside the building. There must have been some way around them. When Altaїr walked to the front door, however, he touched the doorknob but couldn't bring himself to open the door. He stared at the wood, his brow furrowed and his mouth set in a tight line. He'd faced worse foes than those beasts, so why was he so terrified by the prospect of leaving the relative safety of the apartment?

The image of Alex's arm, disfigured and horrible as it had been when he woke that night, burned bright in his mind as if someone had shined a lantern on it. He hadn't asked Alex about it, mostly because he wasn't sure he wanted an explanation. He didn't want to consider the possibility that Alex could be anything less than human. It was one thing to live with a stranger, it was another to live with a monster...

"Dammit," Altaїr hissed, turning and walking back toward the kitchen. He sat at the table, drank his coffee, scowled at the mug and said accusingly, "You tasted better before."

Though he had never realized it, Altaїr had led a rather busy life in Masyaf. He'd always had something to keep his mind busy, and even when his days were dreary and he had time to himself, he was never alone. There was always someone to talk to, always someone to share ideas and socialize with. If all else failed to entertain him, he could turn to the Apple. But now, he had nothing to do, no one to talk to, and not even the Apple to ease his loneliness. For the first time in as long as he could remember, he was  _bored_.

He tried watching television, but he couldn't pay attention to the stories long enough to follow along, and the concept of people not being on the other side of the screen still boggled his mind. His thoughts kept drifting toward the other night, when he had lain beside Alex. He had thought the bed to be his own, but there had been something comforting in being able to lay beside someone again, to be able to hold someone close. It had been so long since Altaїr had slept alone, he'd forgotten what it was like...he'd forgotten how cold it was, how lonely.

It felt wrong to think of Alex that way, though. There was nothing particularly lecherous about men sharing a bed, but it seemed rude, somehow. He hadn't asked Alex's permission to enter his bed. It hadn't been a conscious decision, but he still longed to apologize. And unless he wanted to go chasing after Alex, he'd have to wait until later that night.

Altaїr agonized over the interactions he'd had with Alex since that night, weeding out every little detail for which he could possibly need to apologize. He recognized how unreasonable he was being almost immediately, but he decided that combing through his actions was a better pass time than sitting on the couch tearing his hair out in boredom.

Hours later, the door opened and Altaїr leapt to his feet, relief and excitement putting a strange bounce in his step. He grimaced and stopped short, studying the questioning, almost leery expression on Alex's face.

"What?" he asked.

"Nothing," Altaїr said quickly, smoothing his shirt down his front. "I'm just glad you're home. Talk to me. Say anything. Just...talk."

Alex raised a brow, his posture and expression leaning more definitely toward caution and unease. "Are you sick?" he asked. He glanced toward the counter where the remaining half-bottle of scotch was. "That's still full, right?"

Altaїr rolled his eyes and said, "I haven't touched it." He glanced away from Alex, trying to bite his tongue. "I apologize if I've seemed rude or...out of sorts." He paused, realizing Alex would have nothing to compare his behavior to. A pit of dread settled into his stomach when he made that realization, and he wondered what Alex must think of him. He must think him utterly insane, behaving like this. Hell,  _Altaїr_  thought he was acting like a madman.

"What..." Alex held his hands up and backed up toward the door. "Alright, just back up, wouldya?"

"I've been stuck in this apartment all day," Altaїr explained, taking a few steps back. "What do you do to entertain yourself?"

Alex let out a harsh laugh and said, "You don't want to know what  _I_  do to entertain myself." He walked past Altaїr into the kitchen and pulled a beer out of the fridge. "You tried getting drunk again?"

Altaїr's lip curled and he said, "I think I've had more than enough alcohol for one lifetime."

"Never enough alcohol," Alex sighed. He looked around the apartment and frowned. "Did you clean up?"

The assassin shrugged meekly and said, "There was a mess, I cleaned it. I haven't been a very good guest, I thought I could at least do that much."

Alex nodded approvingly and said, "Domestic life suits you." He drained his beer and pursed his lips, peering into the mouth of the empty bottle. "I could bring you into town, show you what modern filth looks like."

As unappealing as that sounded, Altaїr jumped at the opportunity. "Yes! Let's go."

Leaving the apartment was still a chore, and Altaїr hesitated for a solid ten seconds before he convinced himself to step out into the hallway. Well, it wasn't so much convincing himself as it was Alex dragging him out by the collar of his shirt.

Altaїr straightened his shirt and closed the apartment door behind him, scanning the hall cautiously. There were large black and brown stains in the torn carpet, and where it had been pulled back, there was chipped stone that littered the floor with white powder and rubble. The usual detritus of abandonment was scattered around, damp papers that fluttered in the draft from the windows at each end of the hallway, stray splinters of wood from the paneling around the doors to other apartments.

"What happened to this city?" he asked as they walked toward a stairwell.

"Dunno," Alex said, shrugging. "Woke up to it like this."

"Has it always been so...dirty?"

"God yes," Alex laughed. "I don't remember everything, but I've found ways to figure out what's going on. This virus has practically wiped out the human population of Manhattan, and it's destroying the island itself too." They descended the stairs quickly, ending on the ground floor with Altaїr feeling flushed, but limber.

"I take it you aren't a fan of this city," he said.

"Not in the least," Alex muttered. He pushed open a door and held it for Altaїr, sweeping the street with his veteran gaze. "The military presence here won't let me off the island, and I haven't figured out why."

"Can you not swim?"

"Apparently not." There was no small amount of disdain in his voice when he said, "I seem to have developed an allergy to water."

Altaїr waited for him to finish the joke, but the punchline never came. He frowned, but didn't press the issue as they walked. He gazed around at the enormous buildings that towered up around them, impressed as much as he was horrified. The brick was shot through with black veins of putrefaction, thick vines of red and deep violet ichor curled up and through windows, climbing to the very tops of the buildings high in the sky.

"This city must have been impressive before it fell to ruin," Altaїr said. "I fear my own home will suffer the same fate if left unattended."

"Happens to everyone eventually. People leave, people forget, things start falling apart. Once it starts, there's no stopping it." He shoved his hands in his pockets and ducked his head. "Try not to stick out like a sore thumb. We're getting close."

Altaїr frowned and held his hands up, examining his thumbs. They weren't...what was he talking about? He was about to ask when a blur of pale skin and swollen, red tissue staggered out of an alley and streaked toward them. Altaїr shouted, held his arms up in a defensive posture and prepared for the impact.

Alex, fortunately, moved faster than the monster. He lifted his arm with a flourish that could only be described as infinitely lazy, and seconds before the mutated beast would have crashed into Altaїr, he stepped in its path and slapped his palm against its head.

In his defense, Altaїr had stayed put. He hadn't backed away or tried to run in the face of danger. But when he saw Alex's arm transform, he sucked in a breath between clenched teeth and backpedaled. A storm of black and red lightning enveloped Alex's arm before it congealed into a twisted, horrible manifestation of the dark energy. The black, carapace-like material that replaced his arm punched through the infected creature's skull, its momentum slowing only when it had sank up to Alex's shoulder. The beast twitched, then fell to its knees as its flesh began melting and...and evaporating. A fine mist of blood and worse sprayed up from the creature as it quickly vanished, and Altaїr clamped a hand over his mouth, staggering back another step.

"God save me," he breathed.

Alex glanced over his shoulder, then looked back at the remains of the infected man he'd just destroyed. "Shit," he sighed. "Was hoping to avoid this discussion for a while."

The assassin was quiet for a long moment, and then he shook his head. He had to try three times to speak, and when he finally got the words out, they were reedy and weak. "There's...nothing that needs to be said." He glanced at the coating of blood that had been sprayed over the street and swallowed hard. "I'll just...um...take my leave, I suppose."

"No," Alex said. He stepped forward and the mass of his arm shriveled back into its true form. Or, perhaps it was more accurate to say it shriveled back into the mask Alex allowed Altaїr to see. Was that what Alex really looked like? Was he some horrible monster that Altaїr should run away from, screaming at the top of his lungs? He had seemed so normal, brash and harsh at times, perhaps, but not unpleasant in his own right. He'd been courteous enough to let Altaїr stay in his home and...

Altaїr shuddered as he realized he had  _liked_  this man. He would probably have even been friends with him if they were in his own time. What had happened to make him such a poor judge of character? This was a nightmare...no, worse than a nightmare. One could wake from a bad dream. This...this was something else. A waking torment.

"Hey man, don't look at me like that," Alex said, and for the first time since Altaїr had met the man, his voice was quiet, his words unobtrusive, as if he wasn't sure he wanted to speak them. "I get the monster-act from enough people."

What could he say? Better yet, what  _should_  he say? Did he have to justify himself to a creature such as Alex? Probably not, but Alex deserved at least some explanation of why looking at him made Altaïr want to cry, scream and hide simultaneously.

"I've never seen anything like that," he said softly, choosing his words carefully. "It was rather...startling."

Guarded amusement entered Alex's expression, and the tension in his posture eased, if only slightly. "Yeah, I guess it can be," he said. He smiled slightly, though there was no joy in it. "When I woke up, I was able to do that. I have no idea how or why, but I can. It's kind of terrifying for me too, but I've had time to get used to the idea."

Altaїr nodded slowly and rubbed his hand over his mouth. "Fair enough," he agreed. His belly cramped and he closed his eyes, praying for strength even as he turned, leaned over and was violently ill.

"Oh, that's nasty," Alex muttered.

He spat several times before he straightened and turned back to look at Alex. "Considering the circumstances," he panted, "I don't think that is the most 'nasty' thing that has happened today."

Alex barked a surprised, genuine laugh and then looked up at the sky. "God, why do I always get stuck with the wise asses?"

Since the wisdom of his rear seemed irrelevant, Altaїr ignored the rhetorical question and asked, "Are you human?"

"As far as I know, yeah," Alex replied. He stuck his hands in his jacket pockets and shrugged his shoulders. "Guess most humans don't go around doing  _that_ , though."

"I don't imagine so," Altaїr agreed. He looked up and down the street, grimacing as he spat again. "I suppose my next logical step should be to leave..." It seemed like the best move to make, but at the same time, he hesitated. This was unfamiliar territory,  _dangerous_  territory. He could easily encounter another of those beasts, and without any weapons, he would be the next best thing to helpless. He doubted he could face one down with hand-to-hand combat, and even if he could, what would that accomplish? They were easily twice his size, several times faster than him, and obviously had no sense of self-preservation. Only a mad man would face an opponent who didn't care for his own safety. Or a suicidal man, for that matter.

"You're welcome to leave," Alex said, though his words lacked the conviction they'd held the last time he made the offer. "I have no reason to keep you here."

Altaїr considered that. He knew why he should hesitate to leave, and his reasons were valid. This island was dangerous, unfamiliar. He could easily end up dead or worse...but if he stayed with Alex, what were the chances that would happen anyway? Would he wake up one day with that horrible arm stuck through his chest, turning him into the same fine, bloody mist? He shook his head, shuddering at the very thought.

He couldn't stay here in good conscience, knowing what he did. And he started to say as much when he met Alex's eyes, saw the expectation there. He knew what Altaїr was going to say, and he was readying himself for it. There was something in the man's expression that choked the words in Altaïr's throat and left him floundering for words. Alex had been hurt. Not in the physical sense, but on an emotional level, something had caused him great pain. Grotesque though he might be, Altaїr found it hard not to sympathize with that hurt.

"God help me, I think have to stay," he sighed, running his fingers through his hair. He glanced up at the cloudy sky and then started walking back toward the apartment building.

"Hey, where are you going?" Alex demanded. "Wait up, what the hell?"

Altaїr ignored him and just kept walking. If he thought too much about it, he was going to change his mind. This was madness, pure and utter madness. Choosing to be anywhere near this man would likely end up getting him killed, and that was bad enough. But to willingly associate himself with him... _God Almighty, give me strength._


	5. Old Flames

The walk back to the apartment building was short, but unbelievably frustrating. Alex tried repeatedly to get Altaїr to stop and talk to him, but short of breaking the man's legs, that wasn't going to happen.

"Stubborn asshole," Alex grumbled as he climbed the last flight of stairs.

Altaїr reached the apartment and paused with his hand hovering over the doorknob. "Are these other rooms safe?" he asked, keeping his eyes on the floor.

"I dunno," Alex sighed. "I never thought to check them out." He watched the assassin consider his words, and he reached out when Altaїr turned toward the door across the hall from his own. What the hell was he going to do, play house as his neighbor? "Just wait a second, would yo—"

Altaїr flinched and recoiled when he reached out to touch his shoulder. He glared at the carpet and said, "I'm here because remaining close to you is going to increase my odds of surviving this nightmare. That's all. Please, do not think I'm ungrateful for your help. I'd likely be dead if it weren't for you. But I would rather keep my distance." He glanced at Alex, meeting his eyes for a fraction of a second. "At least for now. Until I figure out how to handle all of this."

This certainly wasn't the first time Alex had been told to piss off—at least, he was pretty sure it wasn't; he couldn't exactly remember any specific instances, but he was sure they existed—but it was the first time since he'd woken up in a morgue that he'd actually had his feelings hurt.

"Fine," he said, holding his hands out to his sides and stepping back. "I get it, I'll back off." He set his jaw and waited for Altaїr to walk into the door across from his before he went inside. He closed the apartment door more carefully than was strictly necessary, because to slam it would have made him seem childish.

 _Why do you care?_  the voice in his head demanded.

"I don't," he snapped. He walked to the fridge and pulled out a beer.

_Then why are you butthurt?_

Alex snarled and slammed the fridge door shut. "I'm not! Shut the fuck up!" He tore at the bottle's cap, slicing open his fingers. Blood welled in the cuts and he bared his teeth. The cuts healed almost immediately, but it was still frustrating that he couldn't even open a damned bottle without fucking it up. He set the bottle against the edge of the counter and smacked the top, watching the cap skitter across the floor.

He didn't care what Altaїr thought of him. It didn't matter even if he did. He was just another piece of shit human who was only looking out for himself. Alex didn't need to concern himself with the bastard.

"Handle all this," he muttered. He took a long pull from his beer and slammed the bottle on the counter. "There is no  _handling_  it. There's dying or surviving. That's it!"

_Which are you doing?_

Alex jerked his hood back and gripped his hair in a tight fist as his head ached painfully. "Go away," he growled, leaning against the counter. "I have enough problems without adding being fucking bonkers to the list."

_Answer the question. Are you dying? Or are you surviving?_

"Obviously, I'm surviving," Alex snapped. "I'm still alive, you prick."

 _You're not living. You're_ subsisting, the voice sneered.

"This conversation is over. Get the fuck out of my head," Alex said through clenched teeth. He waited for a retort, and when none came, he sighed and hung his head. "He can do what he wants...I'm not his fucking mother." Yet he couldn't help but think of the look on Altaїr's face when he'd devoured the infected. He'd been horrified. If Alex had moved too fast or done anything differently, Altaїr would have bolted. He hadn't even given him a chance to explain...

But why should he have to explain? Why did he even care? He'd been alone for as long as he could remember, not giving a shit about what anyone wanted or thought. It was easier that way, easier to get the information he needed when he didn't stop to think about the people he was hurting, the lives he was ending. He'd never been particularly sentimental, yet within days of meeting this stranger, he was questioning his decisions. And worse, he was  _feeling_.

"He's nothing!" he snapped at the empty apartment. His voice echoed back at him, and it only pissed him off more. He made a disgusted sound and drained his beer on his way to the couch. When he flopped down on the cushions, he crossed his ankles, propping his feet up on the arm as he lounged. Maybe if he could sleep for a little while, he could forget all of this had happened. The bastard had his own apartment now, he could stay there for all he cared. At least he'd be out of his hair.

Alex spent maybe twenty minutes on the couch, trying and failing miserably to sleep. Every sound in the apartment was amplified to damn near painful volume. The quiet humming of the fridge was like a fly buzzing its wings directly against his eardrums, the constant  _drip, drip, drip_  of water from the leaky faucet was a series of hammer blows against the front of his skull. Past the annoyances of his faulty appliances, the inhuman shrieks of the infected echoed around the building. He clamped his hands over his ears, trying to drown out the sounds of the city.

"Jesus Christ on a fucking stick," he snarled. He sat up with a frustrated growl and walked to the front door. He stalked out into the hall and pounded on the door opposite his, grinding his teeth as he waited impatiently.

Altaїr opened the door a crack, his expression carefully neutral despite how his tense posture betrayed him. "What do you want?" he asked.

"The fuck is your problem?" he demanded, pushing the door open and stalking into the apartment. It didn't look much different from his, though the paint on the walls was stained and chipped, the drywall warped by the water that dripped down from the apartment above.

"Excuse me?" Altaїr said, practically leaping back to avoid being too close to Alex.

"The way you look at me," Alex growled, jabbing a finger at the other man. "You're treating me like I'm some kind of damned disease, like I'll kill you if you get too close to me."

Altaїr leveled a glare at him and said, "For all I know, that's exactly what you are, and that's exactly what you could do to me." He crossed his arms over his chest and held his head high. "Would you fault me for being cautious?"

"I'd fault you for being a fucking asshole," Alex snapped.

"If I've offended you, it wasn't my intention," the assassin said. The calmness of his voice was a startling contrast to the steel in his posture, and it threw Alex for a loop. "I am not acting as I normally would. Given the circumstances, though, I believe that is more than justifiable."

Alex opened his mouth to snarl a reply, but his words stuck in his throat. He bared his teeth in anger as the things he wanted to say, the frustrations he wanted to vent, tripped over each other, vying to be acknowledged and said first. He finally settled on spitting, "Fuck you," and stalked back out into the hallway. He didn't know where he was going, but he couldn't go back to his apartment. It was too quiet, too claustrophobic.

The sun was warm on his back as he stepped out onto the roof of his apartment building. He walked to the edge and put his hands on his head, lacing his fingers together in his hair. The wind was chilly, and he shivered as it made his jacket billow out around his torso. Why didn't he come up here more often? The wind filled his ears, deafening him to the sounds of the city, and it carried the faint smell of salty ocean spray and the less-pleasing smell of fish.

He stood there for a long moment, breathing slowly and letting the warmth of the sun chase away his frustrations. While he stood there with his eyes closed and his body still, he could pretend, if only for just a moment, that everything was fine, that there wasn't a rotting city full of violence and disease around him.

But, of course, the peace couldn't last for long. The wind stilled abruptly, and the familiar and ever-annoying  _THWACK THWACK THWACK_  of a helicopter's blades pierced the resulting silence.

"Fucking hell, really?" Alex whined. He dropped his arms to his sides and craned his neck around, trying to find the source of the sound. It wasn't hard. It was a giant black dot streaking toward him. How could he miss it?

With an annoyed sigh, Alex ran across the rooftop and leaped nimbly to the next building. It was about a twenty-foot jump, chump change compared to the distances he could jump when he was really trying. He jogged almost lazily across the roof, glancing back every few steps to see how far the helicopter had closed in. It seemed like every time he left his apartment, someone was following him. Especially helicopters. He couldn't go a single day without seeing at least one. Someone had it out for him, and it was starting to annoy him.

As he expected, the helicopter closed in on him fairly rapidly. He didn't even try to avoid it when it hovered over him. The spotlight seemed a little over-the-top, since it was the middle of the day, but he supposed they had to have fun somehow. Maybe rotating the spotlight like a damn fool so it flashed in his eyes repeatedly was their form of entertainment.

The overwhelming sound of the rotor made his ears ache, and he held a hand up in front of his eyes to shade them from the spotlight. "The hell do you want?" Alex shouted, though he knew the pilot had no chance of hearing him. It made him feel better to yell, made him feel like he was in control of the situation, even though he clearly wasn't. It gave him an excuse to lower his guard. Which was why he didn't hear the thrumming of the second helicopter's approach until it was too late.

A hatch opened in the belly of the first helicopter, and something that looked a lot like one of those guns used at concerts to launch t-shirts into the crowd lowered with a faint, electronic whirring sound. Alex squinted his eyes to see better past the spotlight and laughed when he realized what was happening. This fool was trying to capture him! With a net, no less!

"Oh, come on!" he said, "that's almost insulting!"

The wanna-be gun fired, launching an enormous net toward him. The weights tied to the ends of the rope flung out in a spiraling twist and brought the net down over Alex's head. He gripped the stretchy material and consumed it, opening a hole large enough for him to step through. While he was still disentangling his legs, though, the second helicopter launched its own net. He flinched when the concussive explosion from the net-gun made his head spin and actually deafened him in one ear for a few seconds when the sheer force of it burst his eardrum.

The net that flew toward him was heavier this time, and it knocked him off his feet. He snarled, "Son of a bitch!" as he crashed onto the cement, and knotted his fingers in the mesh. It was tightly woven with cold, stiff material. Was this...metal?

Heat flashed across the mesh a fraction of a second before agony seared through his hands, up his arms and into his torso. His jaws snapped together as every muscle in his body clenched and convulsed. He screamed through his teeth and squeezed his eyes shut.

"Soldier!" a voice barked, though Alex could barely hear it past the helicopters and the sizzling of his skin on the net. "Get back behind the line, the hell do you think you're doing?"

"Yessir!" another voice shouted. "Sorry, sir."

"Fucking amateurs," the first voice growled. It was closer this time, probably standing right next to Alex, though he could have been standing on the other side of the damn world for all it mattered.

Alex tried to scream, but he couldn't convince his lungs to work long enough to draw a breath. He tried to writhe, to get away from the net, to stop touching it. His fingers were curled into claws around the damned thing, effectively locking him in. His limbs burned with want for air, and he was certain he was going to die when the pain suddenly vanished. With a ragged gasp that left him choking on his own spit, Alex curled onto his side and then rolled onto his hands and knees, retching as he breathed.

"What...what the f-fuck is this?" he panted. His arms trembled with the effort it took to hold him up, and he collapsed onto the rooftop, groaning as he turned to look up at the man who stood not three feet from him in front of line of six automatic-weapon-toting officers.

The man was tall, maybe a few inches taller than Alex himself. He wore the typical military uniform, though his was darker, cut more closely to fit him. His hair was dark too except for a streak of silver just above his right temple. The lines on his brow and around his eyes and mouth marked him as being older, maybe in his late forties, though the scowl on his face could probably have told Alex that anyway. There's a look a man gets as he ages that no one under thirty can seem to master. This man wore that expression now, and he didn't seem to give a damn how constipated it made him look.

"Who the fuck are you?" Alex shouted. "What did you do to me?"

"Don't you remember me?" A smirk cracked the macho mask he wore. "I'm hurt, Mercer. After we spent all that time chasing you down before. How rude."

Alex's eyes narrowed as pain lanced through his head and he fell back onto the roof, clutching his head. Images of buildings and flashes of half-formed, blurry faces burned through his mind, searing into the darkness behind his eyelids. One face suddenly came into sharp focus, and Alex gasped in pain, staring at her with such intensity his eyes burned from the effort.

"Dana," he breathed.

"There you go," the man said, grinning. "Now you remember."

The girl's eyes were wide with fear, her mouth open in the beginnings of a scream. He remembered...he remembered carrying her across town, jumping from roof to roof. She was hurt, bleeding. Her blood had soaked into his jacket, into his skin. He'd...he'd  _consumed_  her blood. And he'd wanted more. She was right there in his arms, it would have been so easy, just a little effort of will.

A fresh wave of pain and nausea burned through Alex, and he came to his knees again, pushing and pulling at the net. It still wouldn't budge. "What is this, Cross?" he shouted.

"We never did find her body," the man said. "Maybe she drowned. You dropped her in the water, after all."

Alex bared his teeth in a snarl of rage and tore at the net, flinching back when the material cut into his fingers. "I'll fucking kill you," he snarled.

Cross held a hand up to cup his ear and leaned forward as if to say, 'Sorry, couldn't hear you.' Then he raised that hand into the air, made a quick gesture with two fingers and both of the helicopters veered sharply away, turning and flying from the building.

The silence they left in their wake pounded against Alex's eardrums. His own heartbeat was loud enough to make his head ache, and he was slow to regain his senses. Why was he just sitting there? He could consume the net and get out of there without a problem. He tensed his arms, willing them to change their form. The second they did, the net hummed with energy and pain shot up his arms again, locking every muscle in his body into a tight, painful coil.

Alex screamed wordlessly until he ran out of breath, and then he fell onto his side, helpless as a damned kitten.

"This net was designed and created specifically to capture and hold you," Cross said. He stepped into Alex's field of vision and knelt down inches away from the cursed net. "It detects your energy output, and if it rises above a certain point—wattage or something, they explained it to me, but I wasn't paying much attention—it triggers an electric current." An ugly grin curled his lips and he said quietly, "Little hard to get it up when you have twenty four hundred volts of electricity pumping through your body, isn't it?"

Alex's vision started to dim and he had nearly given up when the electricity's quiet thrum vanished. He breathed in sharply and just lay there, trying to convince his body that it wasn't dying anymore. His muscles burned painfully, and he understood then that the electricity was actually doing damage. His body repaired itself instantly, but it still hurt beyond belief. Pain was an excellent motivator to move, but more often than not, it turned strong people into cowering little children.

And that pissed Alex off.

"I'll kill you," he croaked again. "You can't kill me. You can't hold me forever. Eventually, I'm gonna get out. And when I do, I'm coming after you first."

Cross's grin turned into something positively giddy and he said, "I look forward to it."


	6. The Art of Pain

Pain was no stranger to Alex. He'd suffered horrifically in the days since he'd woken up in this city. For Christ's sake, he'd woken up in a morgue. Minutes after he'd escaped, he had been shot repeatedly in an alleyway and then killed a man. His first encounter with one of the infected had ended with him on his knees, clutching at his stomach to keep his guts where they belonged. And, as if that hadn't been enough, the first time he'd fallen off a building—yes,  _fallen_ , he hadn't always been Mr. Graceful—he had broken most of his skeleton. His ribs broke in numerous places, his spine had snapped in half, and his arms and legs were shattered beyond recognition. The pain had only lasted long enough for his body to heal the injuries—ten seconds at the most—but even a heartbeat of pain that intense had driven him half-mad and seared the memory into his brain. Yet none of that compared to the agony Cross introduced him to.

"God  _dammit_!" Alex snarled through gritted teeth. He squeezed his eyes shut and carefully clenched his hands into fists. "I'm gonna rip your fucking arms off and beat you with them."

"That's no way to talk to your host," Cross tsked. "McMullen, make sure you get a good sample size."

"Of course," the third man in the room said in his nasal voice. McMullen was, according to the white lab coat he wore and the tests he'd been running, a scientist in the military's employ. He looked like the horrendous offspring of a toad and a rat. He might have been in his late thirties; his greasy blond hair was slicked back from his receding hairline, and he wore a petulant, seemingly permanent scowl on his face. His glasses magnified his eyes like some cheap villain from a Saturday-morning cartoon, and every time he leaned down to take another sample from Alex, he had to push them back up his nose. "Though I don't appreciate being told what to do."

A sharp, burning pain stabbed into Alex's hip as McMullen pressed a needle thicker than a coffee straw into his skin. The bastard tried to push the needle into his hip, but it skidded across the bone, and there was a sharp cracking sound when it snapped in half.

"Typical," McMullen muttered as he set the broken biopsy needle aside. He picked up a pair of tweezers and leaned down to retrieve the needle from Alex's side.

"Shit," Alex breathed. "Shit, shit shit..." His side burned as McMullen dug around for the needle, but it was an inconsequential pain, more of an annoyance than anything. What worried him were the straps that held him down to the modified autopsy table. There were straps across his forehead, chin, neck, chest, stomach, thighs, knees and ankles. It all seemed way over the top—just one of the straps would have been more than enough to keep him down. They were made of the same material as the net Cross had transported him in, but the electricity that pumped through the metal every time he moved had been increased exponentially. If he so much as twitched, the motion would trigger a mechanism attached to the straps that produced enough electricity to turn a human into crispy briquettes. As Alex had learned, that amount of energy translated into a world of hurt for him.

"I thought you only needed my DNA for this testing crap," Alex panted. He strained his eyes to try to watch Cross without moving his head as the captain walked toward him. "Why do you need all these samples? And why are you taking them twice?"

"The private assigned as my assistant sneezed near the last samples without a mask on," McMullen sneered. "Which reminds me, I need to fire him after we're—" His voice cut off, and he jerked back as electricity hummed through the straps, making Alex spasm in agony. The pulse only lasted a few seconds, but it left Alex weak as his limbs twitched with the residual energy. He didn't even feel the spasm in his hip as his skin writhed, and he heard the tiny, sharp sound of shattering glass followed by a shocked gasp.

McMullen stood sharply and walked out of Alex's field of vision. He muttered quietly to someone else in the room, but Alex couldn't make out what he was saying. It wouldn't have mattered if he could, though, because Cross suddenly erupted into laughter. It was a genuine belly laugh, a sound Alex hadn't heard in...well, he couldn't remember the last time he'd heard someone laugh like that, if he'd ever heard it at all.

"The fuck's so funny?" he panted.

"Oh,  _God_  that was close!" Cross all but roared. He clapped his hands together and then stepped close enough to the table for Alex to see him. "That was so fucking close. Any faster, and he'd be dead."

Alex strained to see where McMullen had gone, but the straps kept him firmly in place. He waited impatiently for something to happen, but after a minute, he would have been thankful just to have Cross stop laughing. It was thoroughly unsettling hearing the Captain laugh...especially with McMullen prowling around the room.

It took maybe five minutes for McMullen to recover from whatever had happened, and when he reappeared, his glasses were missing a lens.

"Put it back," the scientist snapped, looking over his shoulder.

"No, I want him to see this," Cross chuckled. He walked over to the table, brandishing the lens McMullen had removed from. It was fractured, a spider web pattern splintering out from the sliver of metal speared through the glass. Alex stared at the lens for a long moment before he connected it to the fact that his hip didn't hurt anymore.

"I did that?" he asked.

Cross grinned and laughed again, more quietly this time. "Yes, yes you did."

"Stand aside, or I will have you removed from my lab," McMullen seethed. He pointed a scalpel menacingly at Cross until the Captain held up his hands and backed away.

"Alright, alright, don't get your panties in a bunch," Cross said. He tossed the lens aside and set his arms akimbo. "How much longer until you're done with him?"

McMullen muttered sullenly under his breath as he slipped on another pair of gloves. "Why? Are you so eager to dispose of it?"

"Yep. That's my job, after all," the Captain said. He met Alex's eyes for just a second, and something in the other man's expression was viscerally unnerving. From just that glance, Alex could tell that Cross enjoyed his job a little too much. "Faster I get rid of him, faster I get to leave this damned rock."

"That's not very nice," Alex wheezed as McMullen cut into the flesh of his abdomen.

"Aww," Cross cooed in his best baby-voice, "did I huwt the widdle baby's pwecious feelings?" His voice hardened, and he crossed his arms over his chest. "Too damn bad."

Alex snarled in frustration as the Captain's jibes and the small, annoying pains caused by the scientist's testing set his temper to boiling. He flinched when McMullen peeled an unnecessarily large strip of skin away from his stomach and placed it in a Petri dish, and he flexed his arms as if to attack. Electricity pumped through the straps again, strong enough this time to make him froth at the mouth.

"F-fuck!" he screamed as the skin touching the straps sizzled and blackened, filling the room with the stench of burned flesh. The injuries would heal before long, but damn if they didn't hurt.

"Oh stop being such a fucking child," Cross said loudly. "If you'd just sit still—Christ, McMullen!"

As Alex sank back onto the table, gasping for air and whimpering as his muscles trembled, he turned his head just a fraction of an inch to see Cross kneeling on the floor. In the reflection on a glass beaker, Alex saw McMullen laying on the floor curled on his side, his hair standing on end. The latex of the glove on his right hand was melted and blackened.

"Serves...you right...," he panted, grinning in self-satisfaction.

Cross looked up at him, then back down at the unconscious man. He grimaced and stood, turning to face Alex. "I told him to get rubber insulated work gloves," he sighed. He reached out and picked up a clean scalpel from the overbed table beside Alex, examined it, then set it down again. "You know, I think it's ridiculous that McMullen gets to yay and nay every order that comes through this lab," he said. He picked up various instruments and tools as he spoke, examining each in turn and setting them down again without any particular care for where they were before. "See, I tried to order the release of a test subject once. Well, according to my commanding officer, I had no authority over what happens in this lab."

"Who was the test subject?" Alex asked, though there was no inflection in his tone. He didn't give a damn who the test subject was. He didn't care about any of this. What he cared about was getting the hell off that table and away from these crazy ass people. And barring that possibility, he just wanted them to kill him. It would be so much easier, so much less painful.

"I think you know her, actually," Cross mused. He frowned softly and amended, "Well,  _knew_  her, at any rate." He glanced at Alex, an ugly little smile on his lips. "Her name was Karen P—"

Cross hadn't even gotten the woman's name out before agony seared through Alex's head and he screamed. It felt like it was being split in two. He arched against his restraints, trying to grab his head if only to rip the damn thing off his shoulders. His entire body tensed, his muscles coiling into hard knots as electricity flowed through his muscles and into his bones, charbroiling every inch of flesh it could reach.

While his body roasted, his psyche suffered similar abuse. Fragments of images flashed through his mind, piecing together in strange ways that made no sense. They were so vivid that they could only be memories, but they were like a puzzle he'd lost the box to. He could see how they fit together, but there was no bigger picture to reference. He saw a picture on a wall, a woman behind a man with her arms draped over his shoulders and her head leaned against his, but their faces were a blur. There was a flash of a woman sitting cross-legged on the ground, the grass was bright green and lush under his fingertips, the sun was warm on his back. The trees around them bristled with leaves that were just starting to brown, and he could smell a chill on the breeze that signaled the end of summer. But he couldn't see her face. Why couldn't he see her face? It frustrated him to no end that he couldn't see this woman, couldn't identify her. Was this Karen Parker? Who was she? And...why did he remember her like this?

The visions vanished so abruptly Alex recoiled out of pure reflex. He gasped and shook his head, gagging and coughing as he retched.

"Jesus Christ," Cross swore as he unbuckled the straps across Alex's forehead and chin. "You killed the power in the entire building."

As soon as the straps were off, Alex turned his head to the side and coughed hard, forcing bile from his lungs. He spat and then lay back against the table, breathing hard as the pain he felt quickly receded. He finally opened his eyes and saw that the overhead lights were out. An eerie green light filled the room as a backup generator kicked into gear, and he grimaced as he spat again.

"What the fuck was that?" he croaked.

Cross stared at him for a long moment, then shook his head slowly. He wasn't frightened, not that Alex could tell, anyway, but he was certainly caught off guard. "No idea," he said. "But it was interesting."

There was a quiet moan from the floor, and Alex groaned in response, turning his face away. He didn't want to deal with McMullen again, didn't even want to see the little rodent's sleazy face. He wished he'd known he could shoot things out of his body at will so he could have flung the needle faster, harder, anything to have gotten the bastard out of his hair. Too late for that, he supposed.

"Looks like the party's over," Cross sighed as McMullen stirred. He glanced down at the scientist, then back at the overbed table. He cocked a thoughtful brow, swept the room with an accusing gaze, and then reached out, plucking a thick syringe filled with pale pink liquid up from the instruments. It was as wide as two of Alex's fingers, and the needle didn't look any more friendly than the one McMullen had used before.

"Wait," Alex croaked, "wait, what is that?" The captain uncapped it with his teeth, shrugged and stabbed the needle into Alex's abdomen. He spat the cap onto the floor as he depressed the plunger, and fire spread across Alex's stomach.

"Dunno what it is," Cross said. "McMullen mentioned he'd been working on it for a while and was planning to test it on you. Figured now's as good a time as any."

McMullen chose that moment to haul himself to his feet using the edge of the autopsy table. He frantically smoothed his hair back, muttering incoherently as he straightened his glasses and peeled his gloves off. Patches of the material were melted  _into_  his skin, and he hissed as he tried to pull them off. He settled for cutting around the patches with a pair of bandage scissors. He glanced at Cross, his gaze tracking down the captain's arm to the syringe sticking out of Alex's abdomen.

"No!" he hissed. He reached out and smacked Cross's hand away just as the barrel emptied, and he snarled, "It could die!"

"So what if he does?" Cross demanded, though he sounded more amused than angry. "That's the end game here, remember?"

McMullen's lips trembled as if they were about to pull back from his teeth, but he turned pointedly away from Cross, a dark expression on his face. He grabbed the syringe, pulled it unceremoniously from Alex's stomach and walked away, wheeling the overbed table in front of him.

Cross held a hand up to the side of his mouth and loudly whispered, "I think someone's grumpy," as he jabbed a thumb in McMullen's direction.

Although Alex didn't disagree, he didn't respond. He was more preoccupied by the heat spreading through his abdomen. It wasn't necessarily unpleasant, but it was intense. He felt the serum seeping through the muscles under his skin, up into his chest and over the front of his thighs. It seared across every inch of skin and muscle in his body, even his  _eyelids._  This wasn't how shots like that worked, drugs only spread that fast when they were administered intravenously...Cross had just stabbed him in the stomach, not even a fatty tissue. Was this how fast his metabolism worked? It was no wonder he was constantly hungry.

"What did you give me?" he demanded, looking down the line of his body. The overhead lights suddenly flashed into existence, and he squinted, turning his face away. The straps warmed, a threatening heat that made Alex tremble, fearful of another shock.

"It was  _supposed_ to be a remedy for this infestation," McMullen said. "Then this oaf used it before I was ready. I have no idea what it could do now."

"Before you were ready?" Cross asked. He barked a harsh, short laugh and said, "The hell were you expecting? Some kind of ceremony? This is the military, if you need to get something done, you fucking do it. You don't wait around for someone to hold your dick while you piss."

McMullen's eyes flashed and he squared his shoulders, balling his hands into fists at his sides. He was a small man in comparison to Cross, but even small men could do violence when they wanted to. "I didn't have the second injection ready," he seethed. "I developed the formula in two stages, the second was to be administered alongside the first. Otherwise it won't work as I anticipated."

"What was it supposed to do?" Cross snorted. "'Cuz it doesn't seem to be working."

"I don't have to tell you that," McMullen sneered. "I outrank you in this lab."

The amusement vanished from Cross's expression the instant the other man spoke those words, and the Captain's posture shifted from lazy arrogance to tight control in the blink of an eye. He stalked toward McMullen and grabbed the front of the shorter man's jacket. "Not when it comes to Mercer," he said.

Alex watched the exchange dispassionately. None of this was any of his business, he didn't care what internal squabbles these two boneheads were dealing with. He just wanted out of there.

Now that his head was free, he took advantage of Cross and McMullen's momentary distraction, using the second of peace to look around. They were in a circular room with three raised platforms surrounding a recess where he lay on the table. It looked like a freaking lecture hall, and Alex couldn't help but laugh. It looked like some college kid had taken a classroom and pimped it out with a bunch of electronic gadgets covered with knobs and buttons that probably did absolutely nothing. There were two sets of stairs that led up to the platforms, and the doors beyond them had neon green exit signs above them. Wires hung loose from panels that had been removed in the ceiling, and they looked just as out of place as the knobs and buttons.

"It's the mad scientist version of the Enterprise," Alex chuckled. He laid his head back carefully, wary of tensing any other muscles and causing himself more pain. He was about to look back over at Cross and McMullen when he caught a flash of movement out of the corner of his eye.

The door to his left opened just enough to allow a head to poke into the room, but Alex couldn't crane his neck back enough to see whose head it was. The door stayed open for a long moment, then it closed silently, as if it had never happened.

Alex sighed in annoyance and looked over at his torturers. Their argument was heating up, with Cross barely a foot away from McMullen, towering over the shorter man.

"Everyone thinks this is some kind of fucking game," Cross snarled. "We're in a  _war_  here!"

"A war against a contagion," McMullen snorted. "Only a jarhead like you would call it that. You can't wage war against microorganisms."

The captain pointed a menacing finger back at Alex and said, "That ain't a microorganism! I can see that with my own two fucking eyes. I don't know about you, but I think he's something I could wage a war against."

"You can wage war against anything you want," McMullen shot back, "as long as it isn't inside  _my_  lab!"

" _Your_  lab!" Cross laughed. "That's hilarious! Everything in here is paid for by the military. I would just  _love_  to see you try that bullshit with Randall. He'd kick your ass to the curb for thinking you had the right to call this place yours. Your job is to study Mercer, report your findings and keep your trap shut." He grabbed the back of McMullen's lab coat and shoved him toward Alex. "So get to work!"

The scientist staggered when Cross overbalanced him, and he nearly fell onto the autopsy table—or, more accurately, onto Alex. He held his hands up and out to the sides of his head, as if trying to avoid touching something inherently disgusting, and backed up half a step.

"Aw, I'm insulted," Alex sneered. "You gonna run some more tests,  _doctor_?"

McMullen's brow was beaded with sweat, and his face was pasty white. Apparently, he didn't work well under pressure. His sweaty lip curled back from his yellowed teeth in an ugly grimace, and he glanced over his shoulder at Cross, who stood six feet away with his arms crossed over his chest, a menacing scowl on his face.

"Fine," he muttered, reaching into the left pocket of his coat. "You want me to experiment?" He pulled a capped syringe from the pocket and opened it. "I'll experiment." He held the syringe up to the light for a moment, and the opalescent serum inside the barrel looked...threatening. Like it was going to seriously hurt if it touched him.

"What is that?" Alex demanded. He watched McMullen tap the barrel and squeeze the plunger until a drop of the serum dribbled from the tip of the needle. "Don't...come on, man, haven't you done enough to me?"

"Not nearly enough," McMullen said, meeting Alex's eyes for the first time. He stuck the needle into Alex's thigh, depressed the plunger, and pulled it out with a quick tug.

If Alex had thought being shot full of holes was bad, he couldn't have possibly anticipated what that shot delivered.

The warmth that had spread over his body suddenly blossomed into a strange, indirect pain. It felt like his skin was tingling, as if his entire body had fallen asleep all at once, but it was worse. His muscles twitched involuntarily, and his eyes rolled back in his head.

Vaguely, he heard a voice say, "Turn off the electricity. He'll blow out the building again if he starts convulsing." And then everything was silent. The tingling spread everywhere, down his legs and into his feet, up his back and over his scalp. His body started twitching frantically, and he jerked against the straps.

It took him a long moment to realize that he could have broken the straps, but by the time he made the realization, he was in no condition to try it. A horrible fog had settled over his mind, and his fingernails scrabbled at the table beneath him, searching for something to grab onto. His toes curled and he tried to bend his knees, but his restraints held. The tingling intensified everywhere anything came into contact with his skin. It felt like his very nerves were on fire, and the sensation overloaded his brain, made his head jerk this way and that as if he was having a seizure.

"The hell did you give him?" Cross asked, though his voice was warped like some kind of bad sitcom's slow-motion film capture.

"I told you it would have unexpected effects," McMullen said. "Now we observe and record. As you so blatantly ordered."

Alex closed his eyes and rested back against the table, staring up at the lights above him as they danced in playful circles. He smiled, amused by their antics, and started chuckling, though it sounded far from amused even to his own cotton-filled ears. He lay there twitching and in pain, exhausted and hungry, and he just laughed.

 

Dispatching the guards inside the building had been simple enough. Altaїr had raided his fair share of enemy camps in his own time, and this wasn't any different. Sure, the weapons were deadlier and the technology the enemy used was far more advanced, but the stakes were no higher than ever. If he made a mistake, if he so much as mistimed a step, he would be injured—he would most likely die. That was a fact he had learned to acknowledge and accept early in his life. Accepting an immutable fact didn't make it any easier to cope with walking into an area that could easily wind up killing you.

Altaїr peered around a corner, then pulled back immediately when he saw a black-uniformed soldier walking down the hall away from him. He closed his eyes, took a few shallow, silent breaths to calm his nerves and then stepped out into the open, holding himself low to ground out his center of gravity. He stepped carefully, heel-to-toe to avoid making any noise. Being able to so easily slide into familiar habits was a comfort to Altaїr, and he found that his anxiety eased even as he closed in on his target, reached out and wrapped his arm around the man's neck. He grabbed his wrist with his opposite hand, flexing his arms and planting his feet so the other man's writhing wouldn't knock him off balance.

_Five...four...three_...He counted silently, his jaw set in concentration as the man struggled. Too much pressure, and he'd kill the poor fool, too little, and he risked being caught.  _Two..._  The soldier's arms flailed in desperation, reaching out to grab onto Altaїr's hair and the fabric of his shirt.  _One..._  Desperation became uncoordinated groping, and on the last beat of Altaїr's count, the man fell limp in his arms. He laid the soldier down on the floor carefully, ensuring the gear wouldn't make any noise as the unconscious man settled.

Altaїr looked around for a door, anywhere to drag the body. The walls were disappointingly smooth, leaving the assassin no openings or opportunities. He checked the hall behind him before turning and stalking farther into the building. He'd walked about twenty feet before the curve of the hallway brought him to a plain, metal door. The knob was cool to the touch, and when Altaїr pressed his ear to it, he heard nothing in the room beyond.

There was about a fifty-fifty chance that the door would squeak when Altaїr opened it, but he wasn't exactly in a position to hedge his bets, so he turned the doorknob, closed his eyes, whispered a quick prayer and pulled the door open a few inches.

The room beyond the door was circular, set up not unlike the coliseums of the northwestern lands. The platforms around the edge of the room were cluttered with boxes and machines whose purposes and origins were alien and unfamiliar to Altaїr. There was a short flight of steps just in front of the door, and in the depressed circle in the middle of the room, a man was tied to a metal table. He was naked except for a small white towel which saved him from indecency, and he was looking around the room. When the man turned his head to look at the door, Altaїr had to bite his tongue—literally, and painfully—to keep himself from calling out. Alex was strapped to that table, he was the one Altaїr had heard screaming before...it had to be him. More disturbingly, though, Altaїr wondered if Alex was the reason the room smelled like burned meat.

Altaїr glanced around the room, marking the two other men in the room. They were arguing, distracted, but at least one of them would see him if he tried to enter the room. As frustrating as it was, Altaїr backed up and carefully closed the door behind him. He glanced over his shoulder, down the hall and grimaced. There was an unconscious man on the floor when he'd opened the door, and now there wasn't...

The assassin hadn't even managed to spit half a curse before something cracked over the back of his head and silvery light exploded over his vision, blotting the world out and fading into blackness.

He wasn't out for long, but when he woke, he was surprised to find himself in the room in which he'd found Alex. His arms were bound behind him with handcuffs, and he was being carried down to the recessed circle in the middle of the room by two soldiers, one on each of his arms. He remained limp between them and just watched as they dragged him toward the table.

From what he could see as the soldiers dragged him past, Alex was still alive. He was grinning madly, and his eyes were bloodshot, but he seemed otherwise unharmed. That was a relief. It would make getting out of there infinitely easier.

Altaїr grunted when the soldiers got his feet under him and then drove him to his knees. He sucked a breath in through clenched teeth and straightened, struggling to keep his balance. One of the men who'd been arguing before stepped up to him, a scowl on his face. His hair was slicked back from his face, and he had the hardened look of battle in his eyes.

"My name is Altaїr Ibn'La Ahad," Altaїr said. "I am here to retrieve this man. I have no quarrel with you or yours."

The man raised a brow as Altaїr spoke, and he chuckled, "Get a load of this guy, McMullen. Sounds like he's from fucking Robin Hood. He leaned forward, amusement lighting his eyes. "Where are your tights, little man?"

That earned a disturbingly genuine snort of laughter from Alex, and it gave Altaїr the distinct impression that he'd just been insulted.

"I don't understand your jests and quips," Altaїr growled, "nor do I have time for you to explain. It is imperative that you release this man."

"Oh, and why's that?"

Altaїr opened his mouth to answer, hesitated when he realized he didn't have a reason, and clenched his teeth in frustration. "Because I have no idea how I'm going to rescue him, and it would make my life that much easier."

"Cross," the man named McMullen said, "command wants you elsewhere." He held up a black rectangle pointedly. "Whatever you're going to do here, I suggest you do it quickly."

"Fine," Cross sighed. "I never get to have any fun anyway." He turned back to Altaїr and unbuckled a pouch on his belt. He pulled a black object from the pouch and held it loosely in his hand. It was shaped not unlike the throwing sticks he'd seen children in Masyaf play with, but it was smaller, more compact. And it glinted in the overhead lights as if it was made of metal. "I've got some questions for you, Altaїr," Cross said, though he pronounced the name all wrong.

"My name is not All-tear," he said hotly, and his voice held more anger than he realized he'd felt. "It is pronounced Altaїr. Its meaning is something I take great pride in, and mispronouncing it is an insult to the man who named me."

The other man rolled his eyes and shifted his stance, pointing the object he held at Altaїr. "Alright  _All-tai-eer_ ," he said stressing the syllables sardonically, "who are you? Where did you come from?"

Altaїr hesitated at that. What could he tell this man? How could he hope to explain the intricacies of how he happened to be here to a simpleton like this? How could he tell this man who he was?

"I...um," he started.

"He's a time traveler," Alex crowed. He raised his head to look at them and grinned widely. "He's from the Crusades."

Altaїr grimaced and looked back to Cross. He obviously didn't believe Alex, and that was how it should stay. The less people who knew, the better. God knew what someone would do if they learned how he came to be here. Altaїr had seen what the power of the Apple could do in the wrong hands, and he didn't want a repeat performance.

"You know my name," he said, "you know my face. I was born in a far away land, and that is all you need to know of me."

Cross's eyes narrowed, but he didn't press the subject. "Fine, Shakespeare, what are you doing here? How'd you find this place?"

"It's not difficult to track a metal bird in the sky," Altaїr said. "Perhaps you should consider that if you wish your location to remain undisclosed."

"Right," Cross said. "Doesn't matter, no one with half a brain would come near this place." He made a gesture with the object he held and asked, "What's your relationship with him?"

"He saved my life," Altaїr said. "He took me in when I arrived here and gave me shelter, fed me, shared information with me."

"I've seen 'im naked," Alex added helpfully.

Altaїr raised his eyes to the ceiling and prayed for strength. He'd need it to keep him from knocking Alex senseless the second he was free of the handcuffs.

"Is that so?" Cross asked, looking from Altaїr to Alex and back. Something dark entered his eyes, and the smirk that curled his lips was unnerving to say the least. "That's interesting. How'd that come about?"

"It's not important," Altaїr said curtly. "What matters is that you have something I want." He met the other man's eyes and squared his shoulders as best he could. "You have no right to hold this man prisoner. Release him, else I will be forced to take action."

It took a moment for his words to really get through to Cross, and when they did, his expression twisted into something between disapproval and mocking amusement. "You're awfully cocky for someone with a gun on him. Must not have much going on between your ears."

Altaїr frowned, tried to decipher that and decided it wasn't worth his time.

"We're both short on time here, so I'm going to ask you two more questions," Cross said. "First. How did you get inside the base? A helicopter is an easy beacon to follow, but my men are well-trained. How'd you get past them?"

Altaїr waited patiently for the rest of the joke, but when Cross said nothing more, he laughed quietly. "You're serious?" he asked. "I walked in through the front door."

Cross's expression twisted into something sour, and he narrowed his eyes.

"We have novices in my homeland better trained than your so-called  _men_ , and they would at least know to look over their shoulders every once in a while." Altaїr sat up quickly, rolled his shoulders back, slipped his bound hands under his rear and pulled his legs through the loop of his arms. Then he pushed himself to his feet in one swift motion and stood before Cross, grinning as the men to either side of him reached for weapons.

"Stop," Cross said, holding a hand up. The men froze. The captain strode forward a few steps, closing the distance between himself and Altaїr. He looked the assassin up and down, an expression of displeasure on his face. "I don't like you," he said. "I don't like people  _like_  you. And I don't like that you're in my space. I've dealt with Mercer's shit long enough to know that he's most likely going to make it out of here alive. I don't know how, I don't know when, but we still have to find a way to kill the bastard. There's going to be plenty of time between now and then for him to make his escape." He jabbed a finger into Altaїr's chest and started to say, "Back down, or you'll suffer the same fate," but the assassin grabbed his wrist, punched him in the jaw hard enough that something snapped, and twisted his arm around his back.

"Captain!" one of the soldiers cried. He reached for his belt, but Altaїr calmly turned Cross, putting the larger man between him and the other men.

"Place your weapons on the ground and leave the room slowly," the assassin said. "If you do not, I will cause irreparable harm to your captain." He put pressure on the arm he held, bending it as Alex had bent his own arm mere days before. It drove Cross onto the tips of his toes in an attempt to alleviate some of the pain.

"Do as he says," Cross grunted, though his words were muffled around the vowels.

Altaїr peered out from behind the captain's side and saw the two men look at each other. They nodded once, drew their own weapons—what had Cross called them, guns?—and set them on the ground. They raised their hands to shoulder-level and slowly backed away toward the door. Only once they were out of the room did Altaїr allow himself to relax just a bit. Letting his guard down even that much was a sore mistake.

Pain lanced through Altaїr's torso and down his spine as something jabbed into the side of his neck, near the junction between his collarbone and his shoulder. He twisted away from the sudden, sharp pain and raised his arms to defend himself. McMullen stood behind Altaїr, empty handed and backing away quickly. The coward had jabbed a finger in his neck. Was that really all he could think to do? Altaїr saw at least six objects within reach that the man could have used to kill him in a host of different ways, and the craven rat hadn't even thought to look for them!

Altaїr hadn't taken two steps before Cross turned, raised his gun and pointed it at him.

"That wasn't very nice," Cross said.

"Leave him alone!" a voice snarled, and all three of their gazes were drawn toward Alex on the table. He was straining against his bonds, but his eyes were unfocused, glazed, and the whites of his eyes were...glowing. A sickly gray haze seemed to hang around his eyes, as if a vaguely luminescent fog had settled over them. It was disconcerting and incredibly distracting.

In the instant it took Altaїr to recover from the sight, Cross snarled and thunder roared through the room. It left Altaїr deaf for a split second, only to be disoriented by the high-pitched ringing that pierced the silence. He staggered back, moving his hands to his ears, but when he moved his right leg back, it collapsed under his weight, sending him tumbling to the floor.

The pain registered then, and it was unlike anything he had ever felt. His vision went white with it, and he clutched his leg, screaming in wordless, unrestrained agony and confusion.

"You mother...fucker!" Alex cried, though his voice sounded far away past the roaring of blood in Altaїr's ears. "Stop shooting holes in my assassin!"

"Quit your bitching," Cross snapped. "I shot him in the leg, I could have killed him if I wanted to."

Altaїr sucked in a ragged breath, but held back another scream. Instead, he closed his eyes, mastered his panic and channeled his pain and fear into action. He released his leg—which was going to be of absolutely no use to him anyway—and leaned back, dragging himself across the ground.

If anyone asked, he would never,  _never_  admit to making pitiful little desperate sounds with every movement.  _Never_.

"Now come on, if you do that, you're gonna stain the floor," Cross sighed. He walked toward Altaїr, and the assassin pulled himself along a little faster, lashing out with his good leg when the captain stooped to grab him. He cried out when Cross grabbed his right ankle and hauled him back toward the table. His vision blackened around the edges when his leg was dropped, and he fought just to remain conscious. There was a horrible clanging sound, and something like an ancient beast's roar shook the air, followed by more ear-splitting thunder.

"Knock him out!" Cross barked. "Now!"

"With what?"

"I don't fucking know, but he's getting up! Figure it out you dumb fucking—"

Altaїr was spared having to listen to any more of the captain's uncouth language by the agony that blossomed in his shoulder. He felt another scream building in the back of his throat, but he couldn't draw the breath needed to fuel it. While chaos erupted around him, blackness swallowed his vision and left him helpless and bleeding on the floor.


	7. Complications

When he woke, Altaїr felt numb. It wasn't the pleasant, throbbing numbness that accompanied opium or the copious consumption of hashish. This was an all-encompassing numbness that made his breaths come in quick gasps and made him want to cry out just to be sure he still could.

"Calm down," a voice said, and Altaїr suddenly felt pressure on his right shoulder. Sensation! So he wasn't paralyzed...God was merciful after all.

"Where am I?" he rasped

"We're in a containment room," the voice said. "Just sit still, you'll rip your stitches."

Altaїr grimaced and finally opened his eyes. The lights in the room weren't particularly bright, but they were harsh, and their light stabbed into his pupils. The headache that had been building at the base of his skull blossomed into existence, drawing a groan from him.

"Does it hurt?"

"I suspect," Altaїr mumbled, "that what hurts isn't what should be hurting." He brought a hand up to rub his eyes, and when he opened them again, the face to whom the voice belonged finally came into focus. And, to Altaїr's dwindling surprise, the man looking down at him was Alex. He wore a pair of black pants, and nothing else. It wasn't a terrible look for him.

Altaїr lowered his arm back to the floor and said, "You were attacking them, last I remember."

"I tried," Alex said with a nod. "Didn't really go according to plan."

"You had a plan?" Altaїr chuckled disbelievingly.

"Nah," Alex agreed, returning the grin. "I'm not much of one for plans. I prefer to go in balls-out, guns blazing and smash anything that gets in my way."

The amusement Altaїr had felt faltered and withered as he remembered how brash he'd been in his own youth. He'd had that same attitude, and it had gotten one of the best men he knew horrifically injured. It had killed that man's brother...it had taken him so long to regain Malik's trust.

"Why'd you do it?" Alex asked.

"Do what?"

"Why'd you risk yourself, coming here? I don't get it. You could have stayed in the apartment, but you came here instead."

Altaїr considered the other's words and shrugged. He sucked in a harsh breath between clenched teeth, trying to suppress a cry of pain. His shoulder was a throbbing center of agony, and he shivered as the numbness receded, revealing the injuries he'd received.

"I did it because you saved my life," he panted. He squeezed his eyes shut as the muscles in his arm spasmed. "I owed you. If this...had been successful, I would have been freed of my debt."

"You aren't in the Dark Ages anymore," Alex sighed, "you didn't have to risk your life to repay me for anything."

"Honor surpasses the trials of time," Altaїr said quietly. He forced his body to be still, tried to control his reactions so he could separate his mind from the equation as he had been trained to do. "I would go to the ends of the earth to repay a favor."

Alex sighed again, but didn't press the issue. Instead, he touched Altaїr's brow and then moved his fingers to the assassin's neck. "You're warm," he said. "I told Cross to let someone who was actually medically trained to patch you up, but the bastard wouldn't listen."

"They won't fester," Altaїr said confidently. "Not so soon." He opened his eyes again and grimaced. "Why do you care? When last we spoke, you acted like you would rather run me through with a rusted saber than so much as say a kind word to me."

Alex glanced aside to the door and shook his head. "I don't know," he said. "When Cross shot you, I kind of lost it." He ran his fingers through his short hair and smirked, if only slightly. "I hate him a helluva lot more than I dislike you."

"At least one of us has his priorities straight," Altaїr said. He grimaced and raised his right hand toward Alex. "Help me sit up?"

"You should stay down. I don't think you have much more blood to lose."

"I've had worse injuries," he said dismissively. "Please. I don't like lying here on the floor."

"Alright," Alex said as he took Altaїr's hand, "don't say I didn't warn you."

There was something almost comforting in the throbbing pain that lanced his shoulder when he sat up. An almost visceral relief to knowing that he was alive enough to still feel pain at all. He'd been close to death before, had felt her cool touch against his cheek. Alas, she had left him unmolested, deeming his very existence a far worse fate than anything she could conjure up. Altaїr did not fear death; nor, though, did he actively seek her.

"I've been a fool," he sighed. He winced as he turned to  lean against the metal bars that formed one wall of their cell. It put his back to the door that led out of the room, but he was too tired to truly care. His thigh burned, announcing its intent to make his life ever more difficult, and he closed his eyes, hanging his head. "When I awoke in this city," he continued, "I thought I was its master. I left my time as a warrior, a fierce leader followed by some of the most elite forces the world had yet seen, and feared by those who sought to gain control of that which I protected."

Alex studied him as he spoke, though his expression was impossible to read.

"I left that life, that....assumption of power, I suppose you could call it. Involuntary though my departure may have been, I am here."

"How does that make you a fool?"

Altaїr rubbed his hand over the bloody, torn fabric of his pants, peeling back the bandage that covered his wound to examine the stitches. The wound was small...so small that it shouldn't have caused him nearly so much pain.

"Cross couldn't find the bullet," Alex explained. "He had to dig around and cut it wider to make room for the forceps."

The assassin raised a skeptical brow, but didn't press the issue. He smoothed the bandage back onto his leg and leaned his head back against the bars. "I've been pretending that I understand this world, " he said. That my experiences can equal that of any one of your adversaries'." He shook his head slowly, smiling reluctantly. "In this time, I suppose, I am a novice once again."

Alex met his gaze, but looked away quickly. He glanced toward the cell door and cleared his throat in a nervous gesture. "I'm guessing that's significant?" he asked.

"In a way, I guess it isn't," Altaїr admitted. "Really, it was more of a personal observation than anything. Forgive an old man his ramblings."

"Old man," Alex snorted.

"I _am_ over seven hundred years old," Altaїr chuckled.

That earned him a grin, even if it was short-lived. "So if you're from this time period," Alex said, "and I'm inclined to believe that you are from how far you jumped out of your skin when you flushed the toilet back at my apartment, I have to wonder."

Altaїr tried not to remember the incident with the toilet, failed, blushed a little and then cleared his throat. "Wonder what?"

"The Arabs used a different calendar from us," Alex said. "Still do, if I remember right. You knew immediately that you were almost eight hundred years in the future. That math doesn't add up any way you slice it."

Altaїr considered the other man's words for a long moment, nodding his head slowly. "I honestly don't know," he said. "When I awoke, my head ached terribly, and I was exhausted as if I had spent the night studying." He weighed the possibilities and settled for the most likely explanation. "I suppose it could be the Apple's doing. It has shown me vast vaults of knowledge and information in the time it has been in my possession. More testimony and written histories than could fit in any library. It doesn't seem so outlandish that it could act as a translator."

Alex pursed his lips in thought and then shrugged. "Alright, I'll buy that," he said. He looked down at the concrete floor, frowning softly. "When you were dreaming about your wife...do you think she was actually hurt?"

Grief gripped Altaїr's heart so tightly it stole his breath. He set his jaw, clenched his hands into fists and then released the tension in his shoulders when his injuries throbbed agonizingly. "I don't know," he said. "It could have been a dream, or it could have been premonition. The Apple is not of any technology or science that I know. It follows no rules or standards, no theories of reason. By any logic, it is pure magic. I believe it is perfectly capable of foretelling the future, but I pray with every fiber of my being that in this instance, it is wrong."

The memories of his nightmares tried to surface again, but he stubbornly pushed them back. He floundered for a moment as pain overruled his want to speak, and he just sat there for a long moment. Alex, bless him, was smart enough to change the subject.

"I don't know how we're going to get out of this one," he sighed.

"Infiltrating the building was simple enough," Altaїr said.

"You didn't have two bullet holes in you when you came in either," Alex pointed out. "I could get out on my own, but I'm not sure I'll be able to manage it if I have to look after you too."

"I don't need to be looked after," Altaїr snapped. The words were more harsh than he had intended them to be, but they were no less true. He had spent years gaining the respect of his peers and his subordinates, he would be damned if he was truly reduced to the standing of a child.

"Sorry," Alex said, raising his hands in a defensive gesture. "Didn't mean to touch a nerve."

 "No, I'm sorry," Altaїr sighed. He rubbed his face with his right hand and brushed his hair back. "It's been a very long few days...I'm not in my right mind. I understand you're trying to make the best of a bad situation. I should be trying to help you think of ways to escape, not nipping your heels over every offense."

Alex looked lost for words for a moment, but he recovered quickly and said, "Well, yeah. I guess you're right. So uh...got any ideas?"

Altaїr raised a brow at the other, unsure whether to be exasperated or amused by his obliviousness. "If you can find two thin pieces of metal, I can pick the lock," he said, reaching back to tap the bars he leaned against. "If that isn't a possibility, we could always lure one of the guards in and steal his keys."

"If he even has keys," Alex said sourly. He grimaced as his hand moved to his stomach, and his face twisted into an expression of pain.

"What's wrong?" Altaїr asked.

"I don't know...my stomach hurts."

The assassin grimaced and sat forward a little, much to his leg's displeasure. "Were you poisoned?" he asked.

"No," Alex laughed, but a wince cut his amusement short. "I can't be poisoned. It's nothing too bad, I'm just...." His eyes squeezed shut for a moment, and when they opened, there was a faint, sickly gray tint to the whites of his eyes. He looked toward the door and said quietly, "I'm hungry. That's all."

Altaїr studied Alex, wishing he could move away from the other man. If the eye discoloration wasn't enough to unsettle him, the subtle shift in his posture would have. The poised relaxation in Alex's limbs vanished when he leaned forward toward door. He pulled himself to his feet and stood with his hands on the bars, watching the second door that led out into the building proper with hungry, predatory eyes.

"Have they not brought food?" Altaїr asked. He looked around the cell, but found nothing. Not even a bed. It was an empty concrete room with a few stains from where he assumed his injuries had been handled.

"Nothing I like," Alex said. His voice sounded distant, distracted. He gripped the bars tight enough that his knuckles turned white, and when he released them, the metal groaned. "I need to get out of here."

"We were trying to do just that," Altaїr said. "We still can. Sit down and help me think."

"I don't want to think, I want to _act_. No one ever got anything done by thinking, you have to _do_."

Altaїr's eyes narrowed, and he set his hands on the concrete, leaning forward and trying to angle his body so he could throw himself out of the way if need be. He doubted he would make it far, but if he was in a position where he needed to run away from Alex, he doubted he would have been able to escape even if they weren't locked in a room together.

When Alex started pacing, he made small, distinctly disturbing growling sounds. It reminded Altaїr of the tigers that roamed the small, forested regions in his homeland. They were few and far between, and being fortunate enough to see one of the beautiful creatures and live to tell the tale was a feat in and of itself. Here though, with all the ferocity and elegance of the magnificent beast trapped in the body of a man, Altaїr decided he would rather face the cat.

"Alex, I think you should sit down," he said carefully. "We can come up with a plan together, but I cannot work with you if you are like this."

"Like what?" Alex snorted derisively.

Altaїr eyed him and kept his voice low. "Violent."

The word acted like a trigger. As soon as Altaїr said it, Alex froze mid-stride, every inch of his body becoming unnaturally and inhumanly still. The kind of still only achievable by corpses.

A greasy smile pulled Alex's lips back from his teeth, and a ghoulish excitement lit his eyes. "Oh kid," he purred, "you have no idea what violence is." He shifted his weight as if to strike, but didn't have time to so much as lift a hand before there was a heavy _clunk_ and the door beyond their cell swung open on silent hinges.

Cross stepped into the room, his polished boots clacking audibly with each step, a small smirk on his face. Glad to see you're awake," he said, glancing at Altaїr. "Didn't think you'd survive the shock."

"I have endured more tortures than a man twice your age could imagine," Altaїr said in a low, dangerous voice. "Do not think me weak because I am unfamiliar with your weapons. I learn very quickly from my mistakes."

"Of course, of course," Cross allowed, his tone ridiculing. "We wouldn't want to hurt your delicate feelings, ma'am."

Altaїr ground his teeth, but didn't otherwise rise to the challenge. He turned himself around—no easy feat while trying not to scream—and faced the captain. This, of course, turned him just enough away from Alex to make him nervous, but there really was no good way to go about this. If he turned one way, Alex could attack him. If he turned another, Cross could just as easily shoot him in the back. One would definitely get him killed, but if Alex attacked, there was always the chance Cross would take action to save him. And maybe he would sprout wings and fly out of there.

"Mercer," Cross said, and there was a distinctive lack of sneer in his voice. "You've been a pain in my ass far too long. It'll be nice to finally be rid of you."

Alex grinned again, and it was still as eerie as it had been the first time. "Nice to finally see you, Cross," he said as he walked toward the bars. He stuck his arms through, leaning his forearms on a horizontal bar that acted as a partition between the two halves of the cell wall. He rested his brow on one of the bars and let out a low, throaty laugh. "Thanks for letting me out, by the way. You wouldn't believe how boring it is in this little megalomaniac."

There was a brief— _very_ brief—moment where uncertainty flickered over Cross's expression, but it was gone the moment it had appeared. "Who am I talking to?" he asked cautiously.

Altaїr watched as Alex leaned up against the bars. His body language was difficult to read, but he seemed relaxed. His eyes were bright, positively blissful, in fact, even as he whined, "All this one thinks about is whether he's doing the right thing." He pushed his lower lip out in a small pout and said in a childish voice, "He's always questioning his decisions, torturing himself over who he is and what his purpose is." A coy smile played over his face, and he glanced at Altaїr. "Well, maybe that's not _all_ he ever thinks about."

"Who am I talking to?" Cross repeated, his voice more forceful this time.

The playfulness left Alex's posture when Cross spoke, and he grabbed the bars, giving them a fierce shake. "Who the hell do you _think_ you're talking to?" he snarled. "You hired this one to create me, you goddamn fool."

Cross frowned, but didn't otherwise show any reaction to the insult. He watched dispassionately as Alex stepped back, resuming his pacing. "Am I supposed to believe I'm talking to a virus?" he asked in a deadpan voice.

"Believe whatever the fuck you want," Alex snapped. He waffled his hand in the air and leaned against the far wall. "Split personality, schizophrenia, whatever you have to call me to make it fit neatly in a report, I don't care." His expression tightened with pain again, and he leaned forward, almost doubling over so he had to put his hands on his knees to keep from falling. "Tell you what, though, whatever was in those syringes hurt like a mother fucker."

"That's what it was intended to do," Cross said. He started to say more, but a rectangle on his belt squealed, and a distorted voice chattered a series of nearly unintelligible words. They were nonsensical anyway, though.

The captain removed the rectangle from his belt and held it to his ear until the voice cut off. Then he held it to his mouth and said, "Negative. Zeus is not to be transported from this facility." The voice squealed again, and anger twisted Cross's expression into a snarl. "I don't care what he said, you tell him to shove his nose in someone else's ass and give his goddamn orders to someone who cares. Zeus is _my_ responsibility, I will _not_ have him ripped out from under me right when I have him where I want him."

"Ooh," Alex purred, "nice innuendos. Careful, or someone might actually think you like me."

Cross's eye twitched ever so slightly, and he took something from his belt. He flicked his hand, and a stick a long as his forearm extended from his fist. He pressed a button on the handle, and the metal baton thrummed with energy.

Alex flinched away from the menacing stick, but remained where he stood. "Are we gonna play with some more electricity?" he asked. Something that bordered on insanity lit his eyes and he rubbed his hands together. "Good, maybe a little spark'll get my mojo back up and running."

"Alex, I would caution you," Altaїr said. "Do not goad him."

"Keep your little mouth shut, cutie," Alex said without looking at him. "We can play later. Daddy's busy."

Altaїr rocked back, shocked by Alex's words. Never in his life had he been spoken to with such disrespect. He had never been so completely dismissed. He did _not_ like how it felt.

"Come on," Alex cooed. He walked back toward the cell wall and reached through the spaces again, rubbing his fingers over the metal. "We can make this work. He's already scared of you, and I'm pretty sure you've got an idea of how much fun that could be."

"Back off," Cross said, holding the baton toward Alex. He sounded bored, but there was no mistaking the tension in his shoulders. "I won't tell you again."

Alex grinned fiercely and reached out. His hand trembled violently, but he snarled and grabbed the end of the baton. His body went rigid, and his teeth locked around a cry of pain. He snatched the baton from Cross's hand and dropped it on the cell floor.

"Whoo!" he panted, shaking his arms out and rolling his shoulders. He twisted his head left and right, popping his neck. "That was refreshing." He stooped to pick the baton up by its handle and waggled it at Cross. "Poke me with your stick, baby. Let's have some fun."

Cross drew his gun and aimed it, but wasn't nearly fast enough. Alex flipped the baton and hefted it over his shoulder like a spear. He leaned back, bared his teeth in a snarl and thrust the baton forward. It sailed toward the cell wall and would have speared through Cross's chest if  the end of the handle hadn't clipped one of the bars. It flipped end over end and smacked into the captain's torso. The man cried out as electricity crackled and burned through his shirt. His hair stood on end, and he collapsed to his knees. The baton had only touched him for an instant, but when he fell onto his side, he clutched his chest and his mouth worked as if he was trying, and failing, to draw a breath.

"Jailbreak!" Alex cried triumphantly. He reached through the bars and grabbed Cross's arm, dragging him across the floor. He rooted around in the captain's pockets, found a ring of keys and opened the cell door.

"He's dying," Altaїr objected. "You're just going to leave him?"

"You saw what he did to me," Alex said. "You really think he deserves to live? 'Cuz I certainly don't."

"I do not believe a man should be condemned for following the orders given to him by his superiors."

Alex studied Altaїr for a brief moment, then sighed dramatically and stepped out of the cell. He knelt beside Cross and rolled the captain onto his back. He cocked his head to the side, a look of concentration on his face. Then, after a few seconds, he set his hands on Cross's chest and started pressing down rhythmically.

"What are you doing?" Altaїr asked.

"It's called CPR," Alex panted. "Keeps people from dying. Now shut up so I can save this asshole's life."

Though he didn't appreciate being dismissed, Altaїr didn't press. He watched Alex, confused by the process, but interested to learn. When Alex leaned down to breathe into Cross's mouth, he thought he understood what was happening. It felt like ages before Cross finally coughed and turned his head away from Alex.

"There, happy?"

"Very," Altaїr said blandly. "Now we can leave."

"Yeah, yeah, shut up and get over here." Alex walked toward the assassin and pulled him to his feet. It was painful, and putting any pressure at all on his right leg sent fire through his hip and down into his foot, but he could hobble forward with his left arm over Alex's shoulder.

Together, they walked out into the hallway, leaving Captain Cross on the floor, laboring to breathe. They had limped maybe ten feet away when two Blackwatch soldiers marched into the hallway.

"Stop!" one of them shouted, raising the muzzle of his gun.

"Freeze!" the other snapped.

"Fucking hell," Alex sighed, rolling his eyes. He ducked out from under Altaїr's arm and leaned him against the wall. "Stay there."

Altaїr frowned and started to protest, but Alex turned away with murder in his eyes and strode down the hallway. "Come on!" he shouted, thumping his hands on his chest in challenge. "Right here! I'd love to see you try it!"

One of the soldiers was either incredibly brave or unfathomably stupid, because one of the guns fired, a short burst of four shots, and Alex jerked to a stop. He was still for maybe ten seconds before he started forward again.

"Fuck...." one of them breathed.

Alex came to a halt in front of the soldiers and reached out to grab each of their helmets. He pulled their heads apart and then smashed them together. Altaїr expected them to fall to the floor, dizzy from the sudden bash on the head. He did not, however, expect their heads to explode in a shower of blood that painted the walls red. There was a series of sickening, squelching sounds, and when Alex turned around, his naked torso was clean. His jeans were stained, but he was otherwise unmarked by what had just happened.

"What was that?" Altaїr asked tentatively, unsure he wanted to know the answer.

"Nothing. Shut up and let's move," Alex said. He grabbed his arm, set it over his shoulders and half-supported, half-dragged the assassin down the hallway.

They rounded a corner and Altaїr staggered when Alex suddenly stopped. He raised his weary head and looked down the length of the hall. At the end of it, in front of another door, crouched a man in Blackwatch fatigues. He held a large tube on his shoulder, and it looked not unlike the guns the other soldiers had.

"Alex," he started, but they were already backtracking.

"Fucking bazookas," Alex muttered under his breath, "who the hell even uses those anymore?" He swore viciously and knelt down on the floor. "Get on my back. We have to get out of here faster, and I can't do shit with you hanging off of me like that."

"I'm taller than you," Altaїr pointed out. "What if I slow you down?"

"You won't. Now get on my fucking back, or I'll leave you behind," Alex snapped.

Altaїr resigned himself to the indignity of clinging to another man's back and settled himself carefully, gritting his teeth against a cry of pain as his shoulder and leg protested the movement. His limbs trembled when Alex stood, and he nearly fell off when they started moving.

"Hold on," Alex said, leaning forward. "Christ, it's like you never did this as a kid."

"I never had reason to," Altaїr said breathlessly. It was easier with his weight on his torso instead of his arms, but if Alex hadn't been holding onto the backs of his knees with a vice grip, he would certainly have fallen.

"I'm about to do something really stupid," Alex said as he turned around. "Try not to scream too much. It'll be right in my ear, and if you bust my eardrum, I'm not gonna be happy."

Altaїr didn't have the energy to retort. He was so exhausted, he could barely keep his eyes open. Limping around had used much of his stamina, and his body was more than happy to stop responding to his commands if it meant he would lay down and stay still for a while. His eyelids drooped as Alex rounded the corner and charged forward at a run. He watched the soldier with the bazooka, saw the moment he decided to pull the trigger, and closed his eyes just before the weapon fired.


	8. Allies

Zeus had fallen off of a great many things. Most times, the tumbles he took were intentional. Sometimes, they weren't. Okay, lately they'd mostly been unintentional, but that wasn't entirely his fault.

There had only ever been two times when Alex screamed in fear. The first had been when he'd been climbing the Empire State building and missed a step near the top. He was certain that the fall would kill him, and he would never willingly admit to anyone that he'd blubbered like a baby when he crawled out of the crater he'd smashed into the pavement.

That was the first time he'd let his fear override his ability to keep his cool. The second was now, when he side-stepped a rocket, shoved a stunned soldier aside and plowed through the door at the end of the hallway...

...and tumbled head-over-heels into open air.

" _Gak_!" he cried. He stretched his arms out in front of him, intending to catch himself, but his eyes, nose and ears all informed him at once why that wouldn't work. His senses fed him information: a fishy breeze, the faint sounds of a buoy's bell, and the sight of gray, choppy waters, which all equated to a bad time for him.

Altaїr's weight lifted from his shoulders as they fell toward the chilly waters of the Hudson River. Zeus smacked into it face-first and foul-tasting water jetted up his nose and into his mouth, choking him. He thrashed, trying to turn himself around so he could find the surface even as his clothes soaked up water and dragged him down toward the murky depths. Terror pierced his rationality, making him twist and lash out, trying desperately to escape the confines of the water. How many people had drowned in this river after the military had closed the bridges? How many people had foolishly tried to brave the treacherous waters and been shot dead by the soldiers that lined the shores?

The darkness of the river bled into his sight, tightening his field of vision to a narrow tunnel, and he bared his teeth in a snarl as his lungs convulsed, expelling what little air he had left. His abdomen cramped, his muscles burned, and it suddenly felt like he was thrashing in thick sludge. His arms still churned the water, but it felt like he'd been submerged in quick sand. Just as his vision retracted to a pinpoint of light, he felt water rushing over his face, as if he was rising quickly through it. His head broke the surface, and he felt a vague sensation of falling again before he crashed back into the water. His skin crawled, and just before he blacked out, he heard an explosion and another loud splash.

 

"Breathe you fuck," a voice panted. "Come _on_!"

Zeus's eyes opened, and his vision was fuzzy. He tried to do as he was told, and agony stabbed through his lungs. He coughed and spluttered as he rolled onto his side. His cheek pressed into pebbly sand as he vomited water, and he groaned.

"Mercer, get your ass over here and help me."

Confusion clouded his mind, and for a long moment, he stared aimlessly at the blurry figures in front of him. He laid there on his stomach, dumbstruck by what had just happened. Had he almost drowned? What the crap was with that? The last time he'd jumped into the river, he'd shot out of the water like a bat out of hell. This time, it had been a delayed reaction—if it had happened at all.

"What happened?" he croaked.

One of the figures twisted to face him, and he was able to make out the man's face. It was Cross. "Are you alive enough to move? If so, get off your ass."

Zeus stared at him uncomprehendingly, and then his face twisted into an expression of disgust and horror as he realized what must have happened. "Did you...save my life?" he asked.

"Don't be ridiculous," Cross growled. "Why the hell would I save you?"

"Then how'd you end up here?" Zeus demanded.

"I jumped in after this fool," the captain said. "He's my ticket to a promotion if I can prove he broke into the facility."

The words made no sense to him, they weren't important, they weren't what he needed to focus on. His vision was still blurry, and his head was full of cotton, but what worried him the most was the fact that his body wasn't doing what he expected when it was supposed to.

"We have to get moving," Cross panted as he turned away. He leaned down, and after a moment he said, "They'll be sending people out to find you any minute. And if I can't get this asshole breathing, we're gonna have to leave him."

Zeus turned to look around and slowly realized where they were. They were on the bank of the Hudson river, a few feet away from the water's edge. He felt a moment of fierce excitement before he realized it was the wrong shore...they were still on the island. He allowed himself a moment of frustration and anger before he turned back to face Cross and the man who was laying on the ground.

"Is that the soldier who had the bazooka?" he asked as he pushed himself to his knees.

"No, it's the assassin," Cross reported. "And I can't get him breathing again."

Panic gripped Zeus so suddenly that it ripped his breath away. He crouched there for a long moment, frozen with it, and he was only able to shake himself free when Cross bent to breathe into Altaїr's mouth.

One moment he was kneeling on the river bank, the next he was beside Altaїr, his hands hovering over the man's body. His lips were turning blue, and water trickled from the corners of his mouth. "No," Zeus breathed, "no, no, no, you're _not_ going to die on me, not after that bullshit." He pushed Cross's hands away from the assassin's chest and started pulling at his shirt. "Get him off the rocks, if we keep doing CPR with him here, the rocks will hurt him and—"

"Mercer, he's already turning blue," Cross said hotly, "he's gone."

" _No_ ," Zeus snarled, "we can save him!"

"He's dead, Mercer!" Cross shouted. "Get your fucking head out of your ass! We need to get out of here!"

Zeus's vision pulsed red, and he grabbed the front of Cross's uniform. He was trembling with rage, but his grip was no less solid when he pulled the captain forward until their noses were a hair's width apart. "My name," he hissed in a voice that promised violence, "is not _Mercer_."

Cross's eyes narrowed, and he said through clenched teeth, "Then drag him out from whatever rock you put him under so I can save his goddamn boyfriend. Because I can't do it myself."

"You want his help?" Zeus whispered, his grip easing as the tension bled from his shoulders. His lips curled into a half-hearted smirk, and he said, "Fine, but you gotta give me something in return."

The captain glanced at Altaїr, then he looked up at the sky as if in silent prayer. "If it's within my power, fine, I'll give you what you want."

Zeus grinned fiercely, grabbed a handful of Cross's hair and crushed their lips together in a messy, uncoordinated kiss. It lasted only an instant, and it was more a proclamation of intent than a gesture of lust or romance, but when Zeus pulled away, he frowned and patted Cross's cheek. "Damn, and you suck at kissing too," he sighed.

The light blush that spread over Cross's cheeks was payment enough for what he was about to do; the kiss had been for his own enjoyment. Before the captain could come to his senses and deck him, Zeus crawled over Altaїr's body and crouched on the balls of his feet. He rubbed his hands together as he examined the assassin. He was still drenched, and he looked quite small laying there like that. Badass assassin though he may be, every man was small in the face of his end, and this was Altaїr's.

"Not if I can help it," Zeus sighed. He glanced at Cross, who was studiously trying not to look at him, grinned and placed his hands on either side of Altaїr's chest. He closed his eyes, concentrated his will, and in one swift motion, transformed the fingers of each hand into wickedly-tipped hollow spears.

Cross cried out and reached forward to try and stop him, but he drove the spears into Altaїr's chest, baring his teeth as bestial, primal pleasure pulsed through him.

"What the fuck are you doing?" the captain demanded. He looked down at Altaїr, his expression dismayed even as Zeus tilted his head back and closed his eyes.

"I told you I'd save him," Zeus murmured, his voice thick with pleasure. He met Cross's gaze after a moment and smiled lazily, showing his teeth. "I never said how I'd do it."

Anger blazed in Cross's eyes, and for a moment, it looked like he might attack Zeus, but he remained where he knelt. He rested his hands on his knees and shook his head. "I spent all that effort trying to save him, and you go and do this. What the fuck is wrong with you?"

Zeus frowned in concentration and drove the spears a little deeper, sighing in relief as he did. Then he pulled his hands back, reforming his fingers into their normal shape. The wounds leaked blood and a thicker, darker fluid that oozed onto the sand in viscous, menacing drops. "Not quite what I wanted to stick in him, but it'll work for the time being," he said.

"What is that?" Cross demanded. His voice sharpened, and he came to his feet, standing over Zeus with no small amount of hostility in his posture. "What the fuck did you just do to him?"

"I believe I just saved his life," Zeus said in a disinterested voice.

Cross nudged a stone that had been coated in the black ooze with the toe of his shoe, and it disintegrated into sludge. "You infected him, didn't you?" he breathed.

"And if I did?" Zeus asked, coming to his feet.

"You fucker!" Cross snarled, grabbing the front of Zeus's jacket. "You had one job, one _simple_ job! And you managed to find the worst way to fuck it up!"

Zeus's eyes narrowed and he said in a hard voice, "Remind me what that was?"

"Don't fucking infect anyone!" the captain raged. He shoved Zeus away and started pacing in a tight line.  He shook his head and raked his fingers through his hair. "Now I've got two of you to deal with, just _fucking_ wonderful."

"We don't even know if it's gonna take," Zeus called as Cross stalked away. "I could have just killed him for all you know."

"This is your fault!" Cross snarled, turning to point a menacing finger at him. "This is what I get for trying to do the right thing!"

"When have you ever tried to do the right thing?" Zeus demanded. "I haven't known you for very long, but I get the feeling you've always been a giant ball of seething bitchiness."

"That was before I learned Randall is going to level the island," he said dryly.

Zeus opened his mouth to retort, but paused, taking half a step back. "The hell do you mean by that?" he asked.

"What the hell do you think I mean?" Cross said. "The only reason I'm still talking to you is because my commanding officer has made a decision I don't agree with."

"And let me guess, you need my help to disobey orders," Zeus sneered. "Well far be it for me to get between a master and his puppy. I don't want anything to do with you."

Cross started to say something, but a siren blared from the facility they'd just left. It was perched on a small island a quarter mile from shore, and the sound would carry for miles across the water. "I don't have time to argue about this," he said, raising his voice t be heard over the siren. "If you want everyone on the island to die, fine, go about your business, but stay out of my way." He opened a pocket on his belt and took out a plastic bag. In it was a flip phone, nothing fancy, probably a burner. "If you have even a shred of decency," he said as he tossed the phone to Zeus, "you'll keep that on you."

"What am I now, your plaything?"

"I'm the guy who's actually doing something to end this plague," Cross snapped. "I've been working to stop the spread of it. Can you say the same?"

Zeus's lip curled back from his teeth in the beginnings of a snarl, but he cut off when he heard the crackling of radios in the distance. "They'll never believe you let me just get away," he said. "Gotta do something drastic."

"What? What are you going to do?"

"Say hi to the fishes for me, would ya?" Zeus said. Then he grabbed Cross's leg and one arm, spun around with him to gain momentum and flung him out into the river. When the captain splashed into the water, he turned and picked Altaїr up, tossed him over his shoulder, and jogged toward town with a smug expression on his face.


	9. Meltdown

With how secure that facility had been, the military didn't seem to put up much of a fuss when Zeus escaped. They didn't even call in a strike team. He almost felt insulted by the lack of reaction, but he was more concerned with the hunger that burned and writhed in his belly like a living thing. He'd used too much energy without refilling his tanks, and someone was going to have to pay for it eventually.

Luckily for the citizens of Manhattan, their not-so-friendly neighborhood germ was nowhere near a populated area. He was walking through a construction site, muttering under his breath as he shifted his weight to duck under an iron beam that was probably important in the skeleton of the building above him. 

"You're starting to look real tasty," Zeus growled as his stomach cramped with hunger. He readjusted the assassin's limp body over his shoulder and hissed as a muscle in his back twinged painfully. It was then that he realized how close the other man's ass was to his face, and he grimaced in displeasure. "'Least it's cute," he said, giving Altaїr's rear a little pat.

It took them a while to reach civilization, even when Zeus ran. They were close to an infected zone, and although he could easily feed on the mutated unfortunates, he would prefer not to. He wasn't picky, but his palate was at least a little refined. There was something sour to the infected that healthy humans just didn't have. He'd have to consume at least a half dozen of the fools just to bring himself back up to working speed, but he worried that whatever Cross had injected him with would just sap his energy and strength again.

"Bastard," he hissed as he walked down a side road. "Didn't even give me my jacket back." He grimaced when he realized what he'd just said and made a minor effort of will. His jackets and shirts reappeared on his torso, covering his bare skin and warming him against the chilly breeze. "There," he said, feeling satisfied with himself. "Now to find somewhere to put you...."

Zeus spent twenty minutes circling blocks and judging distances. He wanted to leave Altaїr somewhere relatively safe, so that meant he couldn't just plop the man down somewhere in an infected area and go about his merry way, but he also didn't want to leave him somewhere Blackwatch would find him. The assassin knew information about him that he would prefer stayed out of Blackwatch's grubby little hands.

"Could always kill him," Zeus thought aloud. "That'll make the decision for me." After he'd gone through the effort of infecting him? Why the hell would he do that? Then again, why the hell had he infected the bastard in the first place? It had been a snap decision, but it had been a decision nonetheless. "Well shit, now I've gotta put him somewhere." He shook his head and rolled his eyes in exasperation. Why couldn't anything ever just be simple?

With that matter settled, he headed for the building Alex's sister had lived in when she'd been on the island. It was an infected area now, but there was another building just outside the zone that he was pretty sure wouldn't get Altaїr killed. Reasonably sure...they'd just have to wait and see.

Breaking into the building wasn't hard at all. The doors were boarded shut, but that was about it. He broke a window and hopped in, dragging Altaїr in behind him. The lobby's floor was strewn with dust and debris, but lacked the telltale smears of blood and ichor. Nothing had been here yet.

The building had been pretty ritzy before the infection. The floor was polished granite and there were columns in the walls made of something dark and shiny, maybe some kind of metal. None of the lights worked, though, so it leant a lonely cadence to what must have been a truly beautiful sight.

"You owe me big time for this," he sighed as he started up the stairs. "No elevators in a twenty story building, and I gotta bring your ass up at least five of them." He grumbled in irritation, but set about the task with a vengeance. He took the stairs two at a time until he became too exhausted for that, and then he used that exhaustion to fuel his hunger so it drove him up the accursed stairs even faster.

The room Zeus chose was a simple, one bedroom apartment. The door opened to a living room with a hardwood floor and two sofas. The TV was gone, probably snatched by looters who thought they'd make a profit in the riots that followed the bridges being closed, and the overpowering stench of rot from the kitchen made Zeus's eyes smart. It was safe enough, and he wasn't willing to spend the time it would take to find another.

He walked to the bedroom and  peered inside. There was a queen sized bed, a couple night stands, a closet and a dresser; safe enough for his purposes. He walked into the room, dropping Altaїr unceremoniously onto the bed. The assassin's head bounced a few times, but he didn't wake. He was either really out of it, or already dead....

Zeus reached down to feel for the assassin's pulse and breathed a small sigh of relief when he found it. It was weak and thready, but definitely there. He lifted Altaїr's shirt and grinned when he saw that the wounds he'd caused were already healed. So it had worked. Brilliant.

He had about three seconds to feel proud of himself before his vision blacked out. He blinked rapidly, cursing even as his sight returned little by little. When he could see again, he realized he'd fallen to his knees, and he snarled in frustration. What the fuck was wrong with his body? Why was nothing working the way it was supposed to?

His ears rang loudly before the world went silent, and he fell forward, catching himself with an outstretched arm. "What's happening to me!" he shouted.

_You..._ a voice hissed in his mind. _You infected...him._

Zeus shook his head, rubbing his eyes with the heels of his hands. "Back the fuck off," he panted. "I'm the only reason he's still even alive, you idiot."

_You_ infected _him!_

"So fucking what!" Zeus demanded. "Would you rather he be dead?"

_Yes_!

The idea that his host hated him wasn't appalling. It wasn't even outlandish or particularly surprising. What angered Zeus was the timing of the insult. He'd just gone through all the effort to save the assassin's life, and this prick was bawling about how he'd done it. How... _ungrateful_.

"Fine," Zeus grated. "You think you can handle this better than I can? Let's see how long it takes you to consume him without me here to control your hunger." He closed their eyes and released the vice-like hold he'd had over Alex's body and mind.

Regaining control of his body was a distinctly disturbing sensation. His body tingled uncomfortably, as if every one of his muscles had fallen asleep and were waking up simultaneously. As his body settled, he felt a wash of triumph and relief—for about a heartbeat.

Alex cried out and collapsed onto his side as his stomach tried to cave in on itself. He pressed his arms into his abdomen as the pain redoubled, and he let out a choked, wordless sob. His flesh crawled as the virus searched for an outlet, and he turned onto his back, writhing in pain. He knew what was happening, knew what Zeus was intending. Whether this was planned or not was beyond him, he only knew that he had to stop it.

Trembling fingers gripped the cheap carpet, and Alex pulled himself along the floor. If he could reach the window, he could get to safety. There was a fire escape, there was a way down, a way out of this. He didn't have to kill Altaїr, he didn't have to do what Zeus wanted.

_Pretty to think_ , Zeus sneered. _Let's see what you can do about it._

The smothering hunger drove him to his hands and knees, and he turned back toward the bed. He could smell the assassin's blood, he could feel the warmth of the other man's body, and he knew that if he gave into this impulse, only one of them was going to walk out of that room alive.

Alex's eyes filled with tears of anger and frustration as his hands slid forward along the carpet. He crawled forward across the floor, and when he reached the bed, he pulled himself onto his feet and all but collapsed onto the mattress.

"I'm sorry," he whispered as he neared the assassin. " _Fuck_ , I'm so sorry."

 

Pain. That was the first thing he felt as he surfaced from the foggy depths of unconsciousness. But it wasn't just pain, and agony was too kind a word. This was worse than anything he had felt before. If it was only physical, he could have retreated into sleep to shelter himself from that pulsing misery, but his misery extended far beyond the reaches of his flesh.

The world spun wildly before his eyes, and his thoughts followed suit, tumbling and seething together like swollen clouds, crashing into existence in the breath of a lightning bolt and whisking away like foam on an uneasy shore. In those flashing instances, he saw horrific images of humanoid creatures. They were grotesquely mutated, some with pustules as large as man's head on their arms and torsos, others with so much worse. It took him a moment to realize that he recognized those creatures, that he knew what they were. _Human_ , he thought. _These things were human...God help me._

His sightless eyes stretched wide open, and he let out a desperate, pitiful sob even as a pinpoint of light appeared in the farthest reaches of his sight. It grew so bright that it hurt to look at, but no matter how he turned his face, no matter if he closed his eyes, he couldn't escape the unforgiving glow.

The light spread, encompassing his very being in a warmth that quickly grew into a searing agony. It leeched the strength from his limbs, stole his breath and left him quivering.

_Altaїr_ , a voice whispered through his mind.

The heat began a steep crescendo, becoming something physical. Its arms were wrapped around Altaїr, digging its fingers into his very flesh. A figure appeared in the whiteness that nearly blinded him, and he flinched in surprise when he recognized his own face. He stood there, completely nude, his light brown hair long enough to touch the tips of his ears, dark circles under his eyes. This doppelgänger stared at him through apathetic eyes, lifted a hand and pointed to a scar on its left shoulder. When it moved, Altaїr's body moved in time, following the apparition's movements exactly. He felt the bullet wound under his fingertips, fresh and still agonizing, but even as he touched it, the stitches fell away and the skin smoothed into a slightly upraised scar. The doppelgänger moved both of their hands to their thighs and touched the bullet wound there as well, where the stitches again fell away, leaving an uneven mound of scar tissue that felt warm to the touch.

"What is this?" Altaїr whispered in an echoing voice.

"This is your new reality," the apparition said, though it spoke through his own mouth as well. Their words were flat, uninflected entirely, and there was no echo to them whatsoever. As soon as the words left their tongue, they fell to the floor and died, leaving nothing in their wake. "This is _our_ new reality. Be prepared, Son of Umar. Everything you hold dear will soon be tested."

Altaїr flinched at the use of his father's name and tried to turn his face away, but the doppelgänger met his eyes, forcing him to be still. "Open your mind, you fool," it whispered, and the words buzzed on Altaїr's tongue, making his lips tingle even as he spoke. "See what there is to see."

The haggard man lifted their arms in a grandiose gesture, and Altaїr suddenly felt immensely heavy. He felt weight on his shoulders and hips, as if a man was hanging off of his back. His eyes narrowed as he adjusted his footing so he wouldn't fall, and he grimaced as the weight increased until it hurt.

_Hello,_ a new voice whispered in his ear. It was a low, rumbling basso, and it made Altaїr shudder in disgust just to hear. _I've been waiting for this for a_ long _time._

Altaїr's eyes filled with tears, and he didn't realize they weren't his own until he focused on his doppelgänger again. He was crying, his face twisted into an expression of regret, disgust and horror. He wasn't alone, either. Clinging to his back, not unlike an ape, was a black shadow. No, not a shadow—not unless shadows were supposed to drip. The creature's arms were skinny and knobby, with too many joints and uneven musculature, and they were wrapped around Altaїr's double's torso, his hands thrust to mid-forearm into his ribs. Its legs held his waist in a vice grip, and wherever the tar-like material of its flesh touched the apparition's skin, it seeped in, spreading out in black veins that turned the skin a sickly gray color.

"I'm sorry," Altaїr whispered, and the words were not his own. "I'm so sorry."

The parasite's head, the top of which was only just visible over the doppelgänger's shoulder, lifted as it shifted position. Altaїr grimaced in pain as his own copy of the creature shifted, leaning forward to lick a hot, wet line from the top of his shoulder to the shell of his ear. Its saliva was as black as night, and it burned like acid, bubbling on his skin and bursting as he shuddered.

_We're going to have so much fun together,_ it whispered. A split appeared in its humanoid face, revealing a flat ridge of bone where his teeth should have been. Its eyes, though, were its most disturbing feature, and when they opened, Altaїr rocked back as if he'd been punched in the mouth. The eyes glowed with a faint light, but they were otherwise normal. They were human. They were...Alex's eyes.

_So. Much. Fun,_ it hissed.

 

 

Altaїr woke with a start, gasping in shock as the heat he'd felt only moments ago vanished into a bone-chilling cold. His body cramped with it, and he sucked in a halting desperate breath.

"Run," a voice whispered.

The assassin's eyes opened slowly, and before he could even focus them, pain shot up his arms in concentrated spears. It felt like something was ripping into his forearms, trying to dig farther into the meat of the muscles there. He shot up from the bed, jerking his arms back and scrambling away from the presence he felt above him until the back of his head smacked into a wall, rattling his teeth in his jaw. His knee connected with something and he heard a sharp crack, followed by a grunt of pain.

"Alex?" Altaїr panted. He wiped at his bleary eyes, grimacing as the pain in his arms faded away. "What...where are we? How did I get here?"

The room slowly came into focus as his eyes adjusted to the gloom, and he was finally able to see Alex. He wore the same clothing as when Altaїr had first met him, but something about him was different. His face was drawn in a tight expression of pain and fierce concentration. There were tears on his cheeks, and his eyes seemed almost...haunted. The memory of those same eyes in that awful creature's demonic face made Altaїr shudder, and he ignored the faint tremors that shook through his body.

"What's going on, Alex?" he demanded. "Please, for god's sake, talk to me."

The man knelt on the bed not two feet away, but when he spoke, his words were closer to a scream than anything. "Run, you _fucking_ idiot!"

Altaїr gaped at him and started to question the order when Alex struck. One moment he was across the bed, the next, his face was inches from Altaїr's, his hands choking the assassin in a vice grip. He was shaking uncontrollably, and his eyes were so bloodshot that the whites of his eyes were almost completely red. His teeth were bared in a snarl, and spittle flew from his lips as he whispered in a voice that skirted mania, "I don't want to kill you."

"Alex," Altaїr croaked, gripping the man's wrists. He tried to breathe, tried to twist out of the hold, but Alex was an immovable force.

"Give me a reason to let you go," Alex pleaded. He closed his eyes, turned his face away and whispered in a broken voice, "Give _him_ a reason. _Please_. I never wanted this. I never wanted to hurt anyone."

Panic threatened to overwhelm Altaїr as his chest burned, as his screaming lungs tried to draw in air they couldn't reach. He clawed at Alex's fingers, struggled to even form a coherent thought. This certainly wasn't the first time he'd been in a situation like this, but he'd forgotten just how much being choked _hurt_. The blood that couldn't reach the rest of his body pulsed in his ears, gathered in his neck, put pressure on the veins that were weakest. His eyes ached, hell even his _teeth_ pulsed agonizingly, and he was certain his ears were going to explode any second.

Altaїr reached out blindly as his vision narrowed to a dim tunnel, and his mouth gaped open of its own accord, working in what must have resembled the likeness of a fish. His fingers touched Alex's face, felt the wetness on his cheeks, and translated the words his lips formed.

"I'm sorry...I'm so sorry," Alex whispered again and again.

His arms grew heavy with fatigue, and he shuddered as his head throbbed dully. Even the pain of suffocation was minimal compared to the sluggish pulse of his thoughts. Had he really been transported in time to be choked to death? And by a man he thought to be a friend, no less! Perhaps not a friend, though...an ally? An acquaintance? He couldn't even muster the strength to feel indignant as he fell limp in Alex's grip.

The pressure suddenly vanished from his neck, and Altaїr gagged on the sudden release, gasping raggedly. He moved his hands to his throat as his heart beat madly, and he fell onto his side, helpless to do anything else.

"Fuck you," Alex hissed. The mattress shifted as he moved off the bed and staggered to the window. "I'm not going to do it." His voice twisted into something cruel and hideous, and Altaїr watched him grip his hair and double over when he snarled, "Why!" He drew a ragged breath and shouted, "Because I'm not you! Wh-whatever you are, that's not me!"

Altaїr tried to push himself up, and only succeeded in making his head ache even more. He lay there, just trying to get his breathing under control again, and watched the spectacle of a grown man arguing with himself in earnest.

"You're possessed," he croaked.

Alex whirled to face him, and his eyes glowed a fierce red past the blood that leaked from their corners. "You don't say!" he crowed. His face twisted up, and he shook his head violently. "I've got to fix this," he panted. " _Fuck_ , it hurts so much!" He gripped his head again and started to walk toward Altaїr, but just before he reached the foot of the bed, he twisted around with the litheness of a cat and sprinted across the room. He flung himself at the window and fell in a shower of glass.

"Alex!" Altaїr shouted, disbelief making his voice crack. He tried to push himself up again, but his body was too exhausted to respond. He stared at the broken window for a long moment, and turned his face into the sheets, sobbing in pure frustration and reaction.

_God help me,_ he prayed. _I'm surrounded by devils and madmen._


	10. Misfortune's Namesake

Glass showered down around Alex even as he pushed himself to his feet. The cuts on his hands and knees healed as soon as he landed on the shards of window, and the pain he knew he should feel didn't even register in his mind. He stood up and sprinted forward, not daring to pause long enough to think, to check where he was going. If he hesitated, he would lose control. And if he lost control, Altaїr would die.

What are you doing! Zeus howled. Turn around! Turn around!

A queer sense of satisfaction pierced the haze in Alex's mind long enough for him to pant, "Don't like it when you don't get your way, do ya? Now you know how it fucking feels." He suppressed a snarl that was not his own and pushed himself harder, lengthening his strides pumping his arms faster as he ran. He needed to feed, needed to sate his hunger before he did something he would live to regret. And the sooner he was across town, the sooner he could be sure Altaїr would be safe from him.

So what's your plan? Zeus sneered, his voice trembling with barely-contained rage. You gonna keep him as a house pet? A little live-in maid?

Alex ignored the voice and focused on running. The hunger gnawed at his very being and made him long to double over. He fought through the disorienting hunger and dizziness and nearly plowed into a man when he burst out onto the main road.

"Hey watch it!" the man snapped.

There was a fraction of a second where their eyes met and Alex felt a sudden connection. This is a human, he thought, a person. He has a family, friends, dreams and passions and hopes just like I did. Bitterness encroached on the end of that last thought and he set his jaw. Just like I never will again. He studied the man's face in the instant it took him to recognize the Blackwatch uniform. Short brown hair, brown eyes, unimpressive features, small nose, eyes too close together. He wasn't even wearing his helmet. Must have been pretty green. This was the wrong night to send out fresh meat. It smelled too good.

Alex's arms snapped out and he slammed his fists into the soldier's chest. Tendrils of the biomass that composed him shot out from his knuckles and wrists, piercing the young man's flesh and locking him into his prey.

"Fuck!" the soldier cried, his voice thrown into a higher pitch from the pain. "What the...f-fuck!"

There was no point in chatting, and he was too hungry to really give a damn. He bared his teeth as he sank his arms farther into the young man's chest. Blood bubbled at the corners of the soldier's chest and his knees buckled as his eyes rolled back in his skull. It didn't take long to consume him, and once the last vestiges of the man were gone, he straightened and rolled his shoulders. Hunger still burned in his gut, but with less urgency.

"Holy shit!" a male voice cried.

"Oh my god! Somebody call 9-1-1!" a woman screamed.

Alex turned to face the few people who stood behind him and grimaced. A man who looked to be in his mid-thirties stared at him with enormous eyes, as if he was about to bolt. A woman stood about fifteen feet away, her arms held slightly out to her sides, her legs braced as if to run. The tension in her body seemed out of place; why would she fight him when she could run? The answer came in the form of a young face peering out from behind the woman's hip. The girl wore enormous glasses that made her eyes too big for her face, and her mouth made a small little 'o' shape when she met his gaze.

"Fuck," he sighed, looking away from the child. He shook his head and reached out to grab the man and he held him aloft with ease. The mother's eyes widened, brimming with tears as she backed away, holding her child protectively behind her. "Get out of here," Alex snapped. When still she didn't move, he formed his free arm into a spear and cut the man he held from groin to collar bone. "Before I change my mind!" he snarled as the man's mouth stretched wide in an agonized scream.

When they had fled, Alex crouched down to balance on the balls of his feet and focused on his grisly meal. He took this one slower, trying to pace himself so he would know when to stop. He'd been blind with hunger only moments ago, but now he could think and rationalize clearly enough to distinguish friend or foe. He dared not return to Altaїr, though. Not after the fiasco he'd just been a part of.

He thinks you're nuts, Zeus said.

"I am nuts," Alex retorted. He stood and turned a slow circle, searching out his next target. He was a good distance inside one of the safe zones, so it wasn't hard to find his next meal. The woman he picked up cried and pled for her life, but there were no children around to make him hesitate. He consumed her and two other men before he even thought to slow down. The third man he targeted ran, and he enjoyed the chase thoroughly. He could have pounced on the fool any time but he'd been cramped up in that apartment for so long that he'd nearly forgotten what it was like to stretch his legs. To really stretch his legs.

Alex chased the man into a dark alley that even he would have hesitated to enter. He paused long enough to watch the man slow to a halt at the dead end and he grimaced as he stalked forward.

"P-please," the man blubbered. "I'll give you anything you want!"

"I've got everything I need though," Alex purred. "Got a pretty sweet gig here." He reached out to touch his and felt a grim sense of satisfaction when the man flinched. His touch was gentle, merely a brushing of his fingertips across an unshaven jawline. Yet when Alex tried to pull away, he found he was locked in position. His fingers lingered on the whimpering man's skin, and anger burned through him in response. The unwilling hesitation lasted the briefest of moments, but it was long enough to unsettle him.

"I have information," the man said. Tears slid down his cheeks and he shook his head in quick, jerky motions. "I-I know what you are, I know some of what you can do," he whispered as he raised his eyes to meet Alex's. "I can help you."

A sour expression chased away Alex's unease, and he moved his hand to grab the hair on the back of the man's head, twisting down and back hard enough to bow the fool's spine. "I don't need your help," he spat. "What would an insignificant insect like you do to help someone like me?"

The man's eyes widened and he grabbed the front of Alex's shirts with weak hands as he began to pray. His voice wavered from quiet absolution to fierce panic, but none of it seemed worth Alex's attention. With a deft motion, he covered the man's face with his free hand and paused as he whispered, "Save me, God."

Sudden stroke of conscience? Zeus muttered.

"Why don't we go back to me being the one in charge and you ignoring me?" Alex asked. "I liked things better that way." He tensed the muscles in his shoulders and crushed the man's skull like a cockroach. Blood and thicker gray matter squeezed and squelched between his fingertips even as he consumed the corpse, and he'd nearly finished when agony seared through his head and spine, sending him reeling. Light blinded him, and when closing his eyes did nothing, he covered his eyes with his hands, gripping his hair in trembling fists.

Images and light danced in his vision, formless and too bright to follow. When they congealed into something he recognized, the shapes were foreign, the faces unfamiliar. He saw an old man with a leathery face, dark skinned with graying hair at his temples and a bald pate. There were syringes and vials of vivid pink liquid, and he heard a thousand voices crescendo into a cacophony of information he couldn't hope to process.

Then all at once, everything ceased. The light faded as if it had never existed, the voices died out and left his ears ringing incessantly. Something warm and wet trickled down his upper lip, and he tasted blood on the back of his tongue.

Ragland, an unfamiliar voice whispered through his mind. Find Ragland.

There was a beat of calm between the voice and when his heart raced back into action. He sucked in a breath through clenched teeth, coughing in reaction to his burning lungs. He hadn't noticed he'd been holding his breath...what if he'd suffocated? Could he suffocate? It seemed like a long shot, but that was less worrisome than the fact that he'd just been clotheslined by a memory. He'd experienced these types of memories before, information gathered from those he consumed who had known of him or worked with him before the infection—or so he gathered. But he'd never experienced anything as volatile as that, nothing as...violent.

What the fuck was that? Zeus demanded in a breathless voice.

"Didn't like that?" Alex panted as he pushed himself to his feet. "So sorry to make you uncomfortable. What a tragedy."

That...that was... The voice trailed off, and when it spoke again, the words were gruff, almost...husky. That felt amazing.

Alex stared at one of the alley walls, stunned into stillness. He realized what Zeus was talking about, and it felt like an unwelcome and unpleasantly moist towel had just been wrapped around his face and head.

"Oh fuck," he groaned, "you did not just jerk off to that."

You've got control over a few parts that would be vital for that to happen, Zeus said dryly.

"Jesus Christ, get out of my head you freak," he snarled, covering his face with his hands. "I don't have time for this. I have to fix the mess you made so I can fix the mess fuck-face over there in my apartment dragged to my doorstep, and none of that leaves time to consider the idea that voices in my head can masturbate. So if you would do us all a favor, please shut the fuck up and crawl back into whatever hole you slithered out of."

The sound of faraway screams and the distant, inhuman squalling of the infected punctuated the silence that followed his tangent, and he fully expected a smart-assed remark about how he was telling off a figment of his imagination. Instead, all he got was a resigned little, Okay.

And suddenly his head belonged to him once more. There was a noticeable vacancy in the back of his mind, leaving him ample room to consider the fact that Altaїr was still in his apartment, likely scared and trying to make sense of what had just happened to him.

Alex turned to look at the remainders of his meal and felt a little ill. He shook his head and walked down the alley, rolling his shoulders as he leaned into a sprint.

 

It had never occurred to Altaїr just how loud humanity was. In Masyaf, he could sit in his study for hours and never hear anything but the occasional sneeze or cough from a scholar. In his younger years, he'd spent much of his time around and among people. He would often walk through town just to observe Masyaf's people, to see how they lived, to see if they were happy. During those long walks, he heard everything from the playful cries of half-naked children chasing each other with sticks to the tortured braying of over-dramatic sheep being shorn for the first time. He heard the sounds of life, and it was soothing to his ears.

There was nothing soothing about the sounds of this city.

Blaring horns warred with guttural and bestial screeches, while at the same time competing with the debased wails of the dying. The din was so chaotic it made Altaїr dizzy, but no matter how hard he clamped his hands over his ears, he couldn't block it out. He tossed and turned on the bed, paced the length of the too-small room when he could no longer stand to lay down. Nothing seemed to distract him from the damned noise!

Nothing, that is, except for his last interaction with Alex. He knew that he needed to talk to Alex about what had happened, but the very thought of facing the madness in the other man's eyes made Altaїr shudder. There would be a time and a place to handle that; that time may be now, but it could damn well wait until he could stomach the idea.

"I could think if I could get some peace and quiet!" Altaїr snarled. He paced the room a few more times until his temper boiled over and he finally snapped. He grabbed the vase on the bedside table—managing to smack himself in the face with the stiff, cloth shade over the top of it—and hurled it out the window. The glass was already broken from Alex's dive, so he had to wait and listen for the crash.

There was a muted crash, followed by a high-pitched cry of pain, and Altaїr's heart sank.

"Oh god," he breathed, "I've hit someone." He hurried to the window and leaned out far enough to see the street below. He breathed a small sigh of relief when he saw only the grotesque form of one of the infected, then grimaced at the disgust that followed. He'd reacted to his emotions with violence...hadn't he learned all those years ago? How many times must he be taught the same lesson before it finally stuck?

The creature snarled, interrupting his thoughts, and despite being several floors up, he heard the beast clearly. It stared up at him with eyes that were disturbingly human. And then it looked at the building. Its gaze shifted from the ground, to the building and then back to him, and it took Altaїr a moment to come to a sickening conclusion. It was measuring distances.

"God help me," he whispered as he crossed the room. He heard a snarl of effort and the sound of glass shattering, but didn't look back. Instead, he staggered through the dark apartment, stumbling over unfamiliar furniture like a bumbling fool. He kicked a table and fell to the floor, sucking in a pained breath between clenched teeth.

The piercing sound of scrabbling claws reached him from the bedroom, and he swore under his breath. He stood and lurched toward the door, reaching for the handle. When his fingers closed on it, he yanked the door open and staggered out into the hall. The hallway was just as dark as the apartment, but he was more confident as he navigated through it. Unless he was incredibly unfortunate, he could walk down the middle of the hallway and avoid any furniture fixtures.

With his arms stretched out before him, Altaїr made his way quickly down the hall. He stepped on a few uneven sections of carpeting that tripped him up, but he found the end of the hallway without issue. He ran his hands along the wall, searching for a door handle.

The beast howled, and its ungodly voice sent cold tremors down the assassin's spine. His breath quickened and his palms slicked with sweat as his body keyed itself up for a fight. Energy sang through his muscles, made him want to scream and run and hit something all at the same time.

"Come on, come on," Altaїr panted when he reached the end of the hall. He ran his hands along the wall, searching for a door, a window, anything that would get him the hell out of there. He could scale the building down if he needed, for God's sake. But he found nothing. He stared at the darkness before him, prayed as he searched for an opening. Tears of frustration stung his eyes when still he found nothing, and he slammed his fists against the wall. "Come on!"

The infected snorted from farther down the hall, and Altaїr heard it take several quick steps toward him. He rested his forehead against the wall, unwilling to resign himself to this fate. His hand slid down the wall, and he froze when his fingers touched something. An irregularity in the wall. A secret door? Why the hell would it be hidden? Who hid a door in a wall this far up a building?

Altaїr inspected the irregularity, feeling how far it went, how tall it was, and found that it was a seam in the wall that ran from the floor up to a section of the wall that jutted out. It was a doorway! He'd been in a doorway this entire time!

"Where's the handle?" he panted. "The handle, where's the goddamned handle?" He pried at the split in the wall and felt it separate, felt the fissure widen enough for him to fit his hands in. He strained, using all of his strength to pull and push the halves of the door apart, and when the gap was finally wide enough, he squeezed through it.

The creature's steps were heavy as it raced toward the door, and Altaїr's heart raced with panic and adrenaline as he pushed the doors shut again. He could hear the infected's breath, could hear its snarling language, and just before he pushed the doors shut, he felt the thing's foul, wet breath on his face.

He turned to retch in reaction to the stench as the beast howled and slammed its fists against the doors. There was no way for it to get through unless it found the same seam, and Altaїr doubted it was smart enough to figure it out. Still, knowing it was out there was enough to drive him forward. He crawled away from the door and smacked right into another wall. He felt his nose for a break as his eyes watered, but hadn't managed to hit the wall hard enough. He reached out with unsteady hands and felt along the wall for a corner. There was one to his right...and one to his left. He pictured the room in his mind based on what his hands found and felt his heart sink. This wasn't another hallway...it was a space no larger than a washroom. And the only way out was the way he'd entered.

"No," Altaїr whispered. He turned back toward the door where he heard the creature pacing, and he sat back against the wall. He shook his head and started laughing, though there was no humor in it. Through all of that, through the fear and the panic...it seemed ridiculous to him to sit there in the darkness faced with death and realize that he was hungry.


	11. Life's Ups and Downs

The burner phone Cross had given Alex felt like a brick in his hand. It couldn't have weighed more than a quarter of a pound—hell, it wasn't even a flip phone. Yet as he scrolled through the phone's menu, a guilty weight settled in his chest like a rock. How many more horrible things could Cross do to him if he used this phone? If there was a tracking device in it, the captain could find him with minimal effort. He'd already had the phone more than long enough to lead the bastard straight to him—and to Altaїr. The thought of being put back on that table made Alex shudder, and he started to think that smashing the phone wasn't such a bad idea.

And why the hell would Cross want to switch sides anyway? Alex didn't believe for a second that Cross would do it to save the people on the island, so what gave? Did he hope to rise through the military ranks? He was already a captain, how much higher could he rise?

His lack of military knowledge aside, Alex couldn't think of anything that man could want badly enough to ask for his help.

The phone gained another ten pounds, and Alex hung his head to stare at the street far below. He'd needed somewhere quiet and isolated enough to make the call, and although the building he'd found was inhabited, it was far enough from any military bases that he wouldn't be easily spotted.

 _Tick tock, tick tock,_  a voice in his head said, and Alex's first reaction was to snarl, "Shut the fuck up." It took him a moment to realize that it wasn't Zeus who had spoken. The voice had been his own...Christ, he couldn't even tell the difference between his own thoughts and those of his imaginary friend.

"Friend?" he snorted. "Some friend he is." He shook his head to dispel that particular thought and looked at the phone again. Regardless of Cross's motivations, Alex needed information. And the only way to get that information was through the military. Although he could apparently absorb information through the people he consumed, he didn't have time to go around gobbling up everyone he saw in a military uniform in the hopes that he found the right information source.

"He has answers," he reasoned. "if there's a tracking device, he'll try to get you to talk more...unless it transmits constantly. Then he already knows where you are. Fuck..." he thumbed through the menu again and selected the only number that was programmed into the device.

There was a tense pause between Alex putting the phone to his ear and when it started ringing. The sound was tinny, like he was hearing it through a funnel, and he realized that the phone had been damaged in the fall from the window. A floor higher, and this decision would have been made for him. He almost wished it had.

The dial tone rang seven times, and on the eighth, a female operator's voice said, "The number you are trying to call has been disconnected. For more options, please—"

He hung up the call and cursed under his breath. "Figures, the one time I need him, and he fucks me over. Asshole." He stood and started across the roof, feeling a cold pit forming in his stomach at the idea of trying to find one man in an entire city. He didn't even have anywhere to start, only a name.

Suddenly, in a broken and hushed mechanical tone, the phone started playing Wagner's "Ride of the Valkyries." Alex stared at it, his expression a combination of disbelief and incredulity. "What an idiot," he muttered before answering the call with a curt, "Hello?"

"That didn't take nearly as long as I thought it would," Cross said, his tone light. "Starting to trust me?"

"Not in the least," Alex retorted, not quite managing to keep the anger out of his voice.

"Good, it'd be weird if you were." There was the sound of shuffling papers, and Cross muttered something Alex couldn't quite make out. "Alright, what do you want?"

The question plucked a nerve, and he had to work not to let it show in his voice. "I need information."

"And since you're coming to me instead of whatever other sources you've been using up until this point, I'm guessing you've exhausted all of your other options?"

Alex ground his teeth in frustration and said, "You're my  _only_  option." he let that hang between them for as long as he could stand, then demanded, "Why the hell did you give me this phone?"

"Well you see, phones are used to communicate over long distances," Cross said in a mockingly patient voice.

"I saved your life," Alex snapped, forgoing trying to be pleasant, "the least you could do is give me a straight fucking answer."

That killed the amusement in Cross's voice, and when he spoke, his words were clipped, his voice restrained. "And I tried to save your friend. That makes us even, Mercer. Don't think for even a second that I owe you anything, because I don't owe you shit. I'm overextending as it is just to make this call. So if you want answers out of me, you have to at least pretend to give a shit about what I'm trying to do here. You think you can manage that?"

Plastic groaned in his ear as he squeezed the phone, and he considered just breaking the damned thing, and to hell with the consequences. But his stomach did an uneasy little flip at the thought, and he knew he wouldn't be able to live with himself if he didn't at least try to save Altaїr. Was that his personality? Was that the kind of person he'd been before the outbreak? Did Alex Mercer go around saving people because he felt guilty for the harm he caused them? He certainly didn't make pacts with skeevy military captains that got their rocks off by watching a man be tortured.

 _Good thing I'm not that person anymore,_  he thought.  _That would make this pretty damned awkward._

"Fine," he growled. "Damn you, fine. What do you want?"

"Nothing at the moment," Cross drawled. "But the shit's going to hit the fan eventually. I need to know you're going to be in my corner."

"Not like I have much choice," he sighed. "But fine, I'll do what I can to help you...whatever."

"Good," Cross said, and he sounded entirely too pleased with himself. "Now ask your questions."

"I'm looking for a man named Ragland. I have reason to believe he could help Altaїr."

"Where'd you get that name?" Cross asked, sounding genuinely surprised.

"You don't want to know," Alex said. "Just tell me where I can find him and what he does for the military."

Cross paused, seeming to consider his words. "Bradley Ragland was a gene therapist who worked for Gentek way back in the day. He quit when we took on a project he didn't agree with, and since then, we've kept an eye on him. He works out of St. John's."

"Will he help me?" Alex demanded.

"If you ask pretty please? Probably not. He wants nothing to do with Gentek, that was the whole reason he got out of the business. We've had people keeping an eye on him since then, but he hasn't posed an issue. People will be watching the hospital, Mercer."

Alex mulled that over, grimacing as he watched traffic stampede through the city below him as if a virus wasn't rampaging through the city destroying everything and everyone in its path. "I'll figure something out," he sighed. "I'm headed there now."

Cross grunted in reply before ending the call. The phone once again weighed more than it had any right to, and Alex sighed in resignation as he slipped it into his pocket. Standing around moping about not being able to do things the way he wanted wasn't going to get him anywhere, and Altaїr was still waiting for him. Unless he wasn't...unless he'd wandered off or deliberately left. That thought chilled Alex, and he pushed it to the back of his mind to be dealt with later.

St. Paul's wasn't far; it wouldn't take him more than ten minutes to run there. It was, however, smack dab in the middle of a military zone. There were several bases around it, and it was very heavily guarded. He had absolutely no chance of getting anywhere near the hospital as he was, and he couldn't blend into a crowd well enough to risk a disguise. Not when the soldiers in the area would be looking for abnormal behavior. Even without a pandemic causing chaos in the city, a hospital was a valuable resource. It would be well guarded regardless, and he'd have a hell of a time sneaking in.

So, he needed a way to not only make the soldiers turn the other cheek, he needed their eyes to pass right over him. Who, in a large city, could become invisible at will? A homeless person? The soldiers rarely paid them any mind, but a homeless person shambling toward a hospital would look out of place. In the guise of a vagabond, people would assume he didn't have insurance—a hospital was certainly not a place he would be wandering toward.

 _God, humans suck_ , he thought as he followed that particular train of thought.  _God forbid a homeless guy gets the flu. He'd be dead in a week._

So homeless wasn't the way to go. Who else did the soldiers glance over? Children? No, they'd wonder where a kid's parents were and try to find them. Not to mention the fact that Alex vehemently rejected the idea of consuming a child. There had to be something, some group of vagrants in this city that passed unnoticed by the authorities and frequented hospitals.

An idea occurred to Alex, but he didn't like it. He didn't like it one bit. But it was really his only option.

Finding his prey wasn't hard. In a city as densely populated as Manhattan, the kind of person he was after was plentiful, and they came out in force during the late hours of the evening. It was maybe around three in the morning, but there were still plenty skulking about in shadowed alleys and parading around on street corners. The difference between these women and the women of the same profession in other cities was that they had more reason to be skittish. Take on the wrong John, and you could wind up with a few extra body parts or six. The infection didn't always present right away, and some guys wanted to go out with a bang, no matter who they took with them.

If Alex was going to corner one of these women, he had to appear unthreatening. What could be more unthreatening than the man he'd consumed earlier that evening?

The transition between his normal body and that of the disguise was smooth and flawless. He felt himself shrink several inches in height, felt himself gain a few pounds around his middle, and finally frowned when his eyesight blurred around the edges. He needed glasses...that was a first.

When Alex walked toward a group of three women, he hunched his shoulders, ducked his head, and stuck his hands in his pockets. One of the women leaned over to mutter something to another, then sauntered away, her heels clacking noisily in her wake. The two that remained studied him as he walked, and the taller of the two turned away, showing obvious disinterest.

"Hey doll," the last of the women purred. "You lookin' for a good time?" Her words were touched with a light Southern accent, but her features suggested she was of Asian descent. She had high cheekbones, a slight lift to the corners of her eyes, shoulder length, dark hair that framed her ovular face, and the make-up she wore was tastefully applied. When she touched his arm, her fingers were gentle, but firm—insistent, as if she was claiming him. It was too bad he needed her for other purposes; he might have liked to experience what she could do first-hand.

"Are you good?" he asked, keeping his voice low.

"I have a lot of regulars, if that tells you anything," she said, flashing him a smile. It was lovely, more lovely than it had any right to be.

"It does," Alex said. He reached out to brush the backs of his fingers across her cheek, and she gently guided his hand back to his side. "I'd like to be one of them."

"One of who?"

"One of your regulars."

She smiled sweetly, and it was almost enough to convince Alex to find another woman...Almost.

He followed her down the street, admiring the short white skirt she wore and the fur half-coat that was draped over her shoulders. Her clothes were of excellent quality, yet even she couldn't keep them spotless these days. Prostitute she may be, but cheap she certainly was not. She likely would have brought him to a hotel, but he stopped her in an alley a few blocks from where he'd picked her up.

"Don't you want something more private?" she asked, turning to look back at him. Despite her question, she toyed with the neckline of her pale blue blouse. Her fingers pulled the thin fabric back from her flawless skin, and Alex felt his breath hitch in his throat. What the fuck was someone like her doing working the streets?

"This'll do," he said a little more snappishly than he'd meant. The smile on her lips widened, but it didn't reach her eyes. She suddenly looked tired, wearing with too many nightmares weighing on her thin shoulders.

"Three hundred upfront," she said, "but I'll give you a treat first."

"A treat?" Alex asked, and it was all he could do to keep his voice from cracking, of all things! He cleared his throat, and when he was confident he could speak properly he asked, "Why would you do that?"

"You seem different from the others," she said, and her voice had dropped an octave, taking on a breathy quality that made Alex feel a little weak in the knees. "I've been at this a long time, you see. Haven't found anyone who didn't look at me like I was a piece of meat."

Alex rolled his shoulders and tried not to let his expression show how uncomfortable he was with this situation. His body burned with heat and twitched in strange places, making him want to bathe if only to scrub the maddening scent of her from his skin.

"What's this treat?" he asked.

She grinned and stepped forward, closing the gap between them as she braced her hands against his chest. "Something I've given to very few," she replied, her mouth a bare few inches from his. He could feel the heat of her skin through his clothes, could smell the warm scent of perfume and shampoo drifting up from her hair. How long had it been since he'd had a woman? Not in the time he'd been on this island, surely. He ached to take her, to ride out his pleasure until he had nothing left to give, and she had nothing left to take.

The woman's hands slid up his chest, over his throat and rested on the sides of his jaw, cradling his cheeks, and in the space of a breath, she pressed her lips to his. Their kiss was hot, passionate, an embrace that grew into a near-living thing, and Alex lost himself in it. He couldn't remember ever being so close with a person, had never felt such... _intimacy_. It terrified him, but at the same time, he never wanted it to end.

Alex released his will, allowing his body to retake its natural form. The woman must have felt the shift, because she tried to pull back. Alex reached up to lace his fingers into the silky strands of her hair at the base of her skull and pressed her back into the kiss. She tensed, but slowly relaxed against him when he rested his hand at the base of her spine, just above the curve of her butt. She snaked her arms around his neck, and suddenly their chests were pressed together. He could feel the hardness of her nipples through the thin fabric of their shirts, tasted the sweetness of her mouth, and he heard himself growl with need.

"Money upfront," the woman breathed against his lips. "Then I'll show you the time of your life."

 _Just a little longer_ , he begged, and he didn't care that he didn't actually speak the words.  _Please, God, I don't want to be alone again._

Alex pulled back from the kiss, but only enough to touch their brows together. He was trembling, and each breath was fire in his lungs. He didn't want to do this, didn't want to kill this woman. What had she done to deserve it? She had been in the wrong place at the wrong time, and for that she had to die? How fucked was that?

"Pay me or let go," the woman whispered, but there was no mistaking the steel in her voice. That was the last time she would ask before she shut him down.

Alex shook his head, but released her. She stepped back and readjusted her blouse, settling the coat back around her shoulders. "I only take cash," she said breathlessly. "If you get rough, we're done, and you have to wear a—"

Her words cut off, and she cried out when Alex reached out and grabbed her arm. He dragged her toward him, and she squealed in surprise and sudden fear as he wrapped his arms around her middle and pressed her close to him.

"Justin!" she cried faintly as she shoved at his chest. "He's supposed to..." She gasped when Alex's arms constricted, and tears streaked her cheeks. "...s-said I'd be safe."

"I'm sorry," Alex whispered as he closed his eyes. He felt her strain against him, and he moved his arm to lay across her back so he could move her head to his shoulder. "I'm sorry," he said again, and then tightened his grip until her bones cracked. He consumed her quickly, and took no pleasure in it. When he finished, he stood there with his hands at his sides and his head hung in shame as the woman's memories flooded into his mind. He saw her standing before a fat man with a slimy grin, felt her shoulders shake as she cried silently and clutched her stinging cheek. He'd slapped her, and she could say nothing about it. This was her new reality, her new life now that she'd been tainted...ruined. He felt her despair as if it had been his own, and when he resurfaced from the flow of information, his jaw was set in anger and his fists were so tight his knuckles were white.

He didn't want to feel these things, didn't want his heart to be heavy with hurts and pains that were not his own.  _I don't want to be alone again..._ The words echoed in his mind in an endless loop, made him want to scream out of sheer frustration. But he didn't have that luxury. Nor did he have time to dwell. The coldness of reason cooled his anger, and he focused instead on what he needed to do.

After glancing up and down the alley to ensure that he really was alone, he closed his eyes and shook his shoulders loose. It took him a moment to divorce his emotions from the situation, and he used that moment to concentrate on the woman's body. He pictured her in his mind, felt the warmth of her skin against his chest again, the supple give of her body under his hands. He'd only had a few moments with her, but it felt like he knew every peak and valley of her body, and with a minor effort of will, he  _became_  that woman.

He shrank a few inches again, felt his body thin out in some places and thicken in others. His hips expanded to accommodate new organs, his chest became narrower and heavier as breasts grew under the blouse which had already replaced his jackets. Hair grew down past his jaw line, and he ran his fingers through it. This all usually happened in the blink of an eye, but he slowed the process down, paying attention as the various changes took place. It was a distinctly eerie sensation, and he decided that he disliked it very much.

Once he'd finished the transformation, he looked down to examine the clothing he wore. The fur coat was draped over his thin shoulders, and the blouse was still bright and clean. The skirt, however, was harder to tell...his breasts were in the way. He had to push and prod at them to try to see past them and finally settled on just pulling the skirt up a bit to see it. The clothes were too clean, he'd be spotted in no time. No one had clothes this clean anymore—not unless you were incredibly rich and could afford the skyrocketing prices of water and electricity. The only reason Alex had those amenities was because his building was so old. He drew from the emergency reserves to fill his toilet and use the air conditioning when he wasn't out looking for targets. The water was stale and the electricity was spotty at best, but it was more than he could say for the rest of the city.

Alex removed the skirt and knelt down, using the wall of the alley to support himself. He rubbed it on the ground until it was stained a nice dingy brown color and then shimmied back into the skirt. Then he repeated the process with the blouse and fur coat—studiously avoiding looking at the breasts that were bare to the chilly breeze as he did so—and was only satisfied once he reeked of the detritus that littered the ground. He straightened the blouse, smoothed his hair back from his face and started walking down the alley...only to fall flat on his ass when his ankle rolled and pitched him to ground.

"Fucking hell," he muttered, pushing himself back to his feet. "Can't even walk right." He gritted his teeth and walked forward a few steps, wobbling a little at first. He reached out to the alley wall for balance, but by the time he stepped out onto the street, he walked with confidence. He forced a few bruises into existence on his forearms and neck, then drew one long fingernail along his brow. Blood leaned from the shallow cut he opened, and he smeared it over his cheek and chin to obscure the beauty of the woman's face.

As he walked, the people around him would double take, but instead of stopping to help or even ask if the battered, bleeding woman was okay, they turned the collars of their coats up and stared pointedly ahead. On any other night, their reaction would have pissed him off, but tonight, it pleased him. His plan was working. He hoped it would continue to do so, because he doubted he would be able to outrun a strike team in heels.

St. Paul's hospital wasn't an enormous building. It might have been a nice structure in comparison to the businesses and apartment buildings that surrounded it, but since the outbreak started, it had seen a lot more use. Emergency vehicles crowded the ambulance bay like hungry predators, waiting to gobble up their next unfortunate passengers. And while patients came and went like normal, the artists of the city took it as a challenge to redecorate the hospital without being caught. It was strange to see an exhausted, dead-eyed medical technician walk through the main entrance and not even bat an eye at the twenty-something grubby man spray-painting the windows.

"Alright," Alex sighed, and he frowned when his words came out in the woman's voice. "Time to see if this works."

He closed his eyes, hung his head, and hugged himself. As he walked forward, he forced a little wobble into his step—which wasn't exactly difficult, given the circumstances—and watched the legs and feet of those he passed. No one seemed to even notice him. He was jostled by careless people a few times, but was otherwise unmolested until he reached the building itself.

"Hey you!" a gruff voice called

Alex blinked and came to a stop, raising his gaze to look around. A security guard had stepped out of the hospital and was walking toward the graffiti artist. The boy shook his can dubiously, made one more pass over the tag he'd nearly finished and sprinted away when the security guard got too close.

"Yeah, that's right," the man called, "beat it, you little punk. And take your friends with you!"

The guard was no one for Alex to worry about. He could have easily slipped by him. The Blackguard soldier that followed, though, would be a little harder. So far, Alex had passed by the soldiers around the hospital unnoticed. What if he walked past the man, and his body suddenly betrayed him? He hadn't exactly had the best luck with things behaving as they should, and it would be just his luck to suddenly sprout an extra head as he walked through the doors.

Grimacing and ducking his head again, Alex followed the foot traffic toward the doors. He felt the soldier's eyes sweep past him and grinned as a thrilling surge of triumph surged though him.  _Take_ that _Blackwatch!_  he thought viciously.

"Wait. Stop that one."

Alex's heart sank, and his stomach somersaulted. He'd been doing far worse than trespassing over these last few weeks, but there was something unnerving about being called upon when one is trying to be sneaky. So even though it wasn't an abnormal reaction, Alex had to fight not to squirm in discomfort as his mouth ran dry and his palms suddenly slicked with sweat.

 _Just remember_ , he thought, trying to soothe his own hackles,  _if he pisses you off, you can always find him later and eat his face as a snack._  Unfortunately, given his recent bought of self-doubt, the thought gave him less comfort than he had hoped, and he settled for watching the hospital-employed guard wade into the crowd.

"Come with me please, ma'am," he said calmly, though Alex noticed that the man didn't try to touch him.

"I'm sorry," Alex said, pushing his hair back from his face, "have I done something wrong?"

The guard frowned and looked back at the soldier who jerked his head to the side to signal him over.

"No ma'am," he said, "we'd just like a word with you." He didn't look like the stereotypically dumb and brutish guard, but he had a goodly sized paunch and was turning gray around the temples. His thick brows knit together in concern when he saw the blood smeared over Alex's face and neck. So he had a conscience? Good to know.

Alex's vision blurred with tears, and he wiped at his cheeks with trembling fingers. "I'm sorry," he blubbered as he walked forward. He clutched at his fur coat and shook his head as he slurred his words together. "I-I was going home and this man he...he attacked me." He stopped a few feet from the soldier and swayed a little unsteadily on his feet. "I just wanted to go home," he sobbed.

"The man who attacked you," the soldier said in a no-nonsense tone of voice, "was he infected?"

Alex shook his head and wiped his nose on the back of his hand. "No," he said, "I don't go near those awful places...can't stand those terrible creatures."

The soldier glanced at the guard, a hard expression on his face, and Alex quickly understood that if there hadn't been so many people around that he would have been dead regardless of his gender or disposition. "Send her in," he finally said. "Make sure she gets seen."

"Shouldn't we try to find the guy who did this to her?" the guard asked.

"With what resources? You wanna try to find one guy in a city of thousands?"

This must not have occurred to the guard, because he opened his mouth as if to propose an idea, but shut it again at the withering look the soldier gave him. "Come with me then, ma'am," he sighed, shaking his head.

Alex followed the guard to the doors, glancing around before the air-conditioned hospital swallowed him up.

 

Nothing in Altaїr's life could have prepared him for a night like the one he was having. He had never been surrounded by such complete darkness; he couldn't even see his own hand if he held it right in front of his face. After only a few moments, the darkness became a living thing, something that breathed wet heat down his neck and spat fire on his imagination. Every creation of the building was the breath of a horrid beast, the wind a deafening howl.

It would seem perfectly reasonable to be frightened, but Altaїr saw it only as weakness.

 _I've been in worse situations,_  he thought.  _Crawling through that cave system after the tunnel collapsed? That was much worse than this. At least the floor isn't going to drop out from under me this time._

And as if on cue, the entire room shuddered. Altaїr bolted upright from where he'd been laying on the floor and looked around. His pulse roared in his ears, nearly drowning out the snuffling roar of the monster in the hallway. Something squealed tinnily, like the sound of steel against a grindstone, and Altaїr winced, clapping his hands over his ears. The floor lurched, throwing him onto his side, and he grunted in pain.

In a desperate attempt to regain his footing—though he couldn't have said why doing so would improve his situation—Altaїr flung his hand out toward the wall. To his surprise, his fingers closed around a rod no winder than three of his fingers. He gripped it with both hands and hauled himself to his feet. The rod was attached to the wall, but it offered little aid. And when he held tight to it as the room shuddered violently once more, it easily snapped free of its fixture entirely.

"For God's sake, will nothing work as it should?" he snarled. Doorways without doors, rooms that moved, and now pointless handrails. This city was the epitome of nonsense and insanity.

He didn't have long to brood on that particular revelation though, because when next the room lurched, something snapped audibly and a sickening feeling twisted through Altaїr's guts. He held the rod like a stave, trying to twist around to find the walls, but there was nothing. Then, his feet left the floor and he was suddenly suspended in the air.

He cried out when he touched the ceiling and lost hold of the rod. He was falling, that was the only explanation.  _How_  he was falling was beyond him, though, and he was decidedly more concerned by how he was going to land.

The answer came as quickly as the question had, and there was a thunderous  _CRASH_  an instant before Altaїr was flung to the ground. Pain froze him in place, and he stared up at the ceiling. He opened his mouth, tried to breathe, but only felt a wet gurgle in his throat. Blood filled his mouth and spilled from his lips as faint light flickered into existence above him.

Something  _dinged_  in the silence, and dim lights flickered on overhead. The doors Altaїr had entered the room through opened a crack, but couldn't go farther than a few inches because the metal had twisted and warped in the crash. At least he didn't have to worry about anything coming to eat him. Not yet, anyway.

The pain finally hit him, drawing his attention to the reason he couldn't move. He winced as a muscle in his chest spasmed, and he cried out in pain. Jutting out from his right breast was the rod he had broken off of the wall. Four feet of blood-stained metal stood at attention, using his chest as a fulcrum, and Altaїr could do nothing but lay there in agony.

And then the howling of the infected drew nearer.


	12. Gristly Topcis

The inside of the hospital wasn't much different from the outside. Busy, dirty, depressing. The waiting room was packed full of people waiting to be seen, and the doctors and nurses who were crowded in among them looked dead tired and as devoid of hope as their patients. Alex wanted to feel sorry for them, but his emotions were already ragged enough-he closed himself off from whatever miniscule part of his brain let him feel pity.

"I know where to go from here," he said in a timid, small voice. "Thank you for walking with me. I feel better already."

The security guard hoisted his utility belt up a little and nodded, a serious expression on his face. "Was my pleasure, ma'am. A lady like you shouldn't be out there alone at night. If you'd like, I can escort you home after you've seen your doctor."

Alex smiled, but didn't bother to make the effort for it to look genuine. "Thank you, but I'll be fine on my own."

The guard nodded again and flashed Alex a brief smile. "Pleasure meetin' you," he said before leaving.

Once he was gone, Alex sighed and rolled his eyes. What ever happened to people leaving each other alone and minding their own business? Couldn't they just go back to that? Pretending to care was exhausting.

Navigating the hospital turned out to be less difficult than Alex had thought it would be. The offices were labeled by their occupants' last names, and there were signs at every corner to direct him. He avoided taking the elevators-it would be just his luck for Blackwatch to become wise to his ruse at the exact moment he cornered himself in an elevator-and opted for the stairs.

Ragland would be in the morgue beneath the ground floor. Since he was technically not a practicing physician, his efforts were likely better spent elsewhere, trying to develop a cure or at least a remedy to help soothe the pain of those caught in the crossfire of the infection and the military. It was more likely that Ragland would be in the morgue than on the upper floors.

Although there was probably no need for caution, Alex made his way slowly down the hallway, placing his feet carefully to avoid making too much noise. It occurred to him when he'd nearly reached the end of the hall that he could just reabsorb the heels and walk barefoot. He muttered under his breath in irritation and dropped a few inches as the shoes vanished. There was an instant release of tension in his calves that nearly made him fall over, and he flung out his arm to catch himself on the wall.

_Stupid fucking shoes_ , he wanted to snarl, but instead settled for thinking the words viciously.  _Bet I looked fabulous, though._  The thought did nothing to ease his tension, and as he neared the doctor's office, he gathered energy in his limbs, preparing for a fight.

Before he could even knock, the door swung open and a man stepped out into the hall. He was a black man with short, graying hair and dark sunspots on his cheeks and the bridge of his nose. He wasn't tall, but nor was he short, and he wasn't particularly fat or thin. He was incredibly ordinary, and it took Alex by surprise.

"Oh, hello" Dr. Ragland said. His voice was deep, but not impressed. He continued, "I'm sorry, I wasn't expecting to see anyone down here, are you…"

His voice trailed off when he raised his eyes to look at Alex's face, and although nothing in his features could have given him away, the doctor's guard suddenly snapped into place. It was nearly a physical reaction.

"Your face," he said in a voice that didn't quite seem concerned. "What happened to you?"

Alex had intended to keep a low profile and see if he could weasel any information out of the doctor, but the moment he saw the man's disinterested expression, something snapped. As if a bloody, bruised young woman was something so ordinary in his world that it demanded such a lack of reaction!

"Hello," Alex said in the woman's sing-song voice. "I got a bit of a scratch, but I don't like any of the other doctors. None of them are as nice as you."

Ragland turned and locked the door that led into the morgue, dropping his keys in the pocket of his lab coat. "Young lady, I assure you I am not the man you're looking for. I haven't treated a patient in years, and I would not be the one to ask for the help you need." He raised his chin proudly and looked down his nose at the woman before him. "There's a free clinic on the other side of town, still well within the safe zone. I'm sure you can find what you need there-"

Rage suddenly overrode reason, and Alex's shoulders rolled back as he squared himself up to the other man. "What's the matter,  _Ragland_?" he spat. "Afraid I'll give you an infection?"

The doctor stared at him without malice, and instead of shouting, said in a very calm voice, "I will not tolerate being spoken to in such a manner. I'm going to have to ask you to leave, and if you will not go willingly, I will call security to have you removed."

Alex's rage cooled into collected fury, and he narrowed his eyes. This little rat of a man thought he had authority over him? How wrong he was.

"Ragland," Alex practically cooed, "I'm hurt that you don't recognize me." He took a step forward and had to suppress a snarl of frustration when he didn't get the reaction he wanted. "It's my hair, isn't it?" He ran his fingers through the dark locks, closing his eyes and breathing deeply as he did. When he opened his eyes again, they were no longer the dark, chocolate brown of the woman he was impersonating, but his own light blue. Ragland saw the sudden change, and his lips drew back in a grimace.

"Who are you?" he demanded. "What do you want from me?"

"I want answers," Alex said, his voice as calm as his exterior. "You're going to give them to me."

"You're so certain?" Ragland challenged.

The ruse was getting old. Alex was wasting too much time, and he was starting to lose hope that he would ever return to Altaïr. He was already confused about so many things, and now the assassin was weighing on his mind.

_What the fuck are you doing?_  he demanded of himself.  _This is the only man on this whole fucking island who would be able to help you, and you treat him like_ this _? And why? Because he made you mad?_

_I don't like his face_ , Alex retorted, though the thought was half-hearted at best. He knew he was being ridiculous, but he also knew that he was running out of time.

_Well, it's not like we're Prince Charming or anything. Buck up and apologize to the man._

For Ragland to have gotten to where he was today-and for him to have gotten there intact, at that-he had to be smart. If there was going to be any hope for Alex to get on his good side, he couldn't just flat-out manipulate him. He was going to have to make the bastard trust him-fat chance of that happening.

Alex let out an annoyed little  _huff_  and held his hands out to his sides. "Look, I'm unarmed."

The doctor eyed him suspiciously, but made no effort to move. "I see that."

"I'm going to do something you might find a little weird," Alex cautioned. "I'm not going to hurt you, but just...don't freak out."

Alex didn't think Ragland would take his warning to heart. Yet when he transformed into his natural body-which was a  _distinctly_  uncomfortable sensation that made him want to readjust his boxers-the doctor remained calm. The man's eyes became stony, but the tension in his shoulders eased ever so slightly.

"You're one of them," Ragland said. "One of the infected."

Alex grinned humorlessly and shook his head. "I'm in a different league, doctor. And I need your help."

"No," Ragland snapped, not bothering to even pause to consider. "Absolutely not." The defiance in his posture tripled, and he balled his hands into fists at his sides. "I told Gentek that I wanted nothing to do with that nonsense. Don't you drag me into it now."

"Listen to me," Alex said, raising his voice. "I need your help, and I think we have similar motives."

The obvious disbelief in Ragland's expression irritated Alex to no end, but he just set his jaw and barreled on. "My name is Alex Mercer, and I'm trying to stop this outbreak. I woke up in a morgue, and I've been on the run since."

"Why?" Ragland asked. "Why are you running?"

"Good question," Alex chuckled. "Maybe it was my winning smile, or my charm." When the doctor didn't laugh, he rolled his eyes and continued, "It probably had something to do with the outbreak, but I don't know anything for sure. All I  _do_  know is that Blackwatch wants me dead, and they've been going to great lengths to catch me. They hound me night and day, and I hate it. I hate Blackwatch as much as you dislike Gentek."

Reading people had never been Alex's strong suit, but if Ragland hadn't been breathing, he could have mistaken the doctor for a statue. The man studied him, giving nothing away and giving Alex no sense of how he was going to react.

After what seemed like a lifetime, the doctor finally shifted, rolling his shoulders. "I refuse."

"Refuse?" Alex repeated. He shook his head and flexed his arms into massive limbs composed of black and red biomass. "Doc, you don't have a choice. Either you help me, or you become a snack and I move on to the next qualified geneticist I come across."

Ragland fixed him with a glare, but didn't disagree. "Very well, then. If what you say is true, I will offer you whatever aid I can."

"And if what I say is not true?"

"Then I wouldn't very well have a way to tell, now would I?"

"S'pose not," Alex drawled. He crossed his arms over his chest, unsure if their pissing contest was going to come to a head. "So you'll help me?"

"If I can," the doctor said, nodding. He looked past Alex's shoulder and gestured back toward the morgue entrance. "I would invite you in, but…."

"Doc, I'm not a vampire," Alex said dryly. "If I want in, I'll get in. I don't need your invitation." He noted the lack of amusement in the older man's eyes and continued, "We can talk out here in the hall."

Though this solution didn't seem to please him, Ragland nodded and gestured for Alex to speak.

"I know that you don't like Gentek, and that the idea of working with them probably makes you want to hurl, but something needs to be done about the outbreak. I think you're the man to do it."

"Do what?" Ragland demanded. "You talk like I'm some big-shot scientist with a lab and unlimited funds at my disposal. He shook his head and rubbed a hand over his balding pate. "I'm a geneticist doing his best not to be swept under the rug with all that's been going on." He glanced behind him again and sighed in irritation. "Look, I've been working on something that might be able to work...eventually, anyway, but it seems-"

"What do you need to make it work  _now_?" Alex interrupted.

"Time," the doctor snapped, annoyed at being cut off. "Also access to the virus in its original form. It's mutated too much, I can't create a vaccine for every form the virus can and will take, I need the original code so I can break it down and neutralize it."

"Okay," Alex said, nodding slowly. "I understood most of that. What you have now, is there any chance you might be able to make it work? Even for one person?"

"No chance whatsoever," Ragland said firmly. "It might as well be saline." A cautions look entered his eyes, and he asked, "Why?"

Alex said nothing. How could he explain any of this to Ragland? He wouldn't understand, and even if he did, it wouldn't make him work faster. It was better just to let him think what he would and get back to Altaïr.

Unfortunately, he didn't get to make that decision. Ragland's brows shot up, then knit together in a glower. "You want it for yourself. You want to cure yourself."

He couldn't help it. The idea alone was ridiculous, but the doctor's expression pushed Alex over the edge. He started laughing. There was nothing humorous, or even particularly pleasant about it; it was full of desperation and self-loathing.

"Doc, there's no curing me. I'm fucked any way you slice it," he chuckled, wiping a tear from his eye. He sighed and met the doctor's eyes again. "Figure out what you need to make the cure work." He pulled the burner phone out of his pocket and found its number. "You got something to write with?"

Ragland found a pen and wrote the numbers Alex fed him on his hand.

"Call me when you figure out what you need. I'll see what I can do."

"What will you do in the meantime?" Ragland asked. "Where will you go?"

A sour realization twisted Alex's lips into a grimace, and he looked at the floor.

"I have to go tell someone they're dead."

On the other side of Manhattan, a small child sat crying in a dark alley. This child was young, no older than six or seven, and it no longer knew its name. Its small hands clawed at bricks and asphalt alike, searching endlessly for something to satisfy its hunger, its thirst, the gaping maw of emptiness that had opened in its belly.

This nameless child shambled down the narrow alley to which it had fled, pressing its bleeding hands to its abdomen. It walked aimlessly, lost and alone, though it didn't feel lonely. It saw through a haze of red, watched as another man was tackled and fed upon. The child smelled the fresh, warm blood and tripped over itself in its haste to feed, but found the corpse cleaned to the bone by the time it crawled to its hands and knees.

The child stood and turned as if to walk, but paused mid-stride when it heard a deafening  _crash_. It turned to face the source of the noise, cocking its head to one side as it tried-and failed-to understand.

In an instant, there was a surge of motion, and the child was swept forward in a wave of howling, snarling mass. This child, who had become that which it feared most in life, sprinted at the head of the horde of monsters, and it felt a rush of fierce pleasure when it leaped over a pile of rubble and smashed through a cracked window. It tumbled head-over-heels into the ground, and came to a halt before an elevator door. There was a crack between the warped doors, a crack just wide enough to fit its small arm through.

 

The sun was just starting to rise over the horizon when Alex finally reached the building where he'd left Altaïr. It would still be at least another couple of hours before the sun rose high enough to cast light over the towering buildings, so when Alex slowed to a jog on the right block, he saw the disaster bathed in murky, predawn shadows.

Most of the windows on the ground floor were shattered, and the doors were completely ripped from their hinges and lay trampled and broken on the ground.

Driven by concern, Alex skidded to a halt and nearly fell when he entered the building. There must have been at least a dozen infected there, congregated around one spot on the far wall. They all ignored Alex when he walked toward them, as they were too intent on whatever they had found.

"Oi!" Alex shouted, clapping his hands sharply, "break it up. This ain't the place for an orgy!"

A few of the smaller ones broke away and ran for the exits, apparently liking their odds of escaping better than their odds of living through a confrontation. The larger ones ignored him completely as they clawed furiously at the plaster around the elevator they were so desperate to open. The few who  _did_  try to take Alex on quickly realized their mistake, but were incapable of escaping their fates.

"Hey! Big, tall and fugly! You hear what I said?" He reached out to tap one of the largest infected he had ever seen on its hideously mangled shoulder and it spun to face him with a roar of rage and hunger. Alex took this in stride and twisted the monster's head off as if he was decapitating an overgrown tick. The body hadn't even settled before the last two infected fled the building, crying out in their grotesque voices.

Now, that left the matter of what they were so interested in. Alex turned to look at the elevator, and his stomach lurched when he saw a small form in a filthy, torn dress. The tiny flowers on the fabric were hardly visible through the grime, and the child-for that's what she was-had lost one of her little pink shoes. Shards of glass stuck out at random from her arms and legs, but she didn't seem bothered by the wounds in the slightest.

Alex's stomach lurched as he realized what this little girl was. He watched her reach into the gap between the elevator doors and pull out something bloody. Then she stuffed it in her mouth and turned to look at him. Half of her face was melted, as if someone had poured acid on her skin and left it to heal. She bared her bloody teeth and hissed at him, a sound that was disturbingly like that of a feral cat.

"I'm sorry," he croaked, and realized that he was telling the truth this time. This little girl had done nothing to deserve this, and yet here she was, feeding on whatever dregs she could stir up in this cesspool of a city. Alex only wished he had tears left to shed for her.

He dispatched the child quickly and without malice. A quick twist, a sharp snap, and her small body hardly made a sound when it fell.

"The elevator must have fallen from one of the top floors for it to have caused this much damage," he said aloud. Hearing his own voice was more comforting than being deafened by the sudden silence in the lobby. He surveyed the damage the infected had done to the wall-hell, they'd been trying to claw the cart out of the elevator shaft. "Something caught their attention."

The lights weren't working in the cart, which really wasn't a surprise, and Alex had to use all of his strength to pry the doors open. When he finally stepped into the cart, he blindly felt around on the floor. It was a person, obviously, but the body was still warm. He found the neck and pressed two fingers to it, searching for a pulse, and felt a sickening little jolt in his heart when he found one. No one else had been in this building...he'd been sure of it. No one could have survived in this part of town, not with how quickly the infection was spreading. So who was….

"Oh fuck," Alex breathed, and his voice came out as a croak. He dragged Altaïr out of the elevator by his ankles and settled him in a spot where the shadows weren't quite so dark. A length of metal protruded from the assassin's chest, and the man was pasty white, his body drenched in sweat. Alex hadn't even had time to fully understand what had happened before Altaïr coughed wetly and turned his head, his face screwing up in pain.

"Christ, Altaïr," Alex said, his voice an odd mixture of fear and relief. "What happened?"

The assassin shook his head as his mouth worked. He made small, pained sounds, but couldn't seem to speak.

"This is gonna hurt," Alex said, quickly realizing what was wrong. He gripped the bloody end of the rod and then hesitated. "Try not to scream, or they might come back."

Alex yanked sharply, and Altaïr grunted loudly. His chest heaved as he sucked in a breath, but he found no relief. He coughed blood and Alex had to turn him onto his side to keep him from drowning again.

"Why..," Altaïr panted a moment later, "am I not...dead?"

Alex floundered for an answer. He'd spent the entire run here trying to think of a way to tell this prideful man that he'd drowned the other night. He hadn't found a good way to phrase it-at least, not in a way that wouldn't get him hit, kicked or otherwise attacked.

"Answer me!" Altaïr snarled, but his rage was short-lived. He rolled onto his back again, groaning in pain. "My foot...God, what's wrong with my foot?"

It took Alex a minute to follow the sudden change in topic, and when he followed the assassin's trembling hands, he touched something warm and wet.

"You probably hurt it when the elevator fell," he said. He grabbed Altaïr's ankles and dragged him into the dim light that seeped through the windows in dusty columns. The lighting wasn't great, but it was enough to let Alex see the extent of the damage. And boy, was there damage.

The assassin's shoe had been peeled away, exposing his toes and most of his foot. What was left of his foot, anyway. The skin was completely gone, and the muscles and tendons looked like they'd been savaged by some beast with vicious fangs.

_Or,_  he thought in a sickening realization,  _a little girl with sharp fingernails._

His skin crawled, and he shook his head. "I-I was right," he croaked. He cleared his throat and continued sternly, "Just a sprain. Nothing to worry about."

"I don't believe you," Altaïr wheezed and blood bubbled at the corners of his mouth when he spoke.

"Well, tough tits," Alex snapped, "you can have a look for yourself and start panicking, or you can shut up and give me a minute to think of how to fix this."

"Think quickly, I'm starving."

Of all the things he could possibly complain about right now, Altaïr chose his stomach? Boy were his priorities skewed.

_He's hungry,_  Zeus whispered in the back of his mind. There was no malice in the words, only a mild interest. The voice sounded tired more than anything.

_I'll find him a burger later,_  Alex snapped in reply.

_It's not beef he's hungry for,_  Zeus said patiently,  _and you know that._

Something akin to urgent disbelief stirred in Alex's core, and he shook his head again.

"No," he said aloud. "Not this time. I won't fail him too."

Altaïr started to question him, but wasn't given the chance. Alex grabbed his arms, pulled him into a sitting position, then hauled him onto his shoulders in a deadman's carry. The assassin weighed significantly more than Alex, but he carried the man in that moment as if he weighed nothing.

Without a clue as to where he was going, Alex ran. He ran until his lungs burned and his veins pumped battery acid, and then he ran some more. Altaïr had fallen unconscious from the pain, so he didn't have to listen to the man's grunts and small cries of discomfort. Yet he had to focus on not stopping to wake the assassin up, if only to have something other than Zeus's calm rationalizations in his ear.

_He's different_ , the voice said.  _If he was like us, he'd have healed already. He needs to feed, needs something to fuel his transformation._

"What the hell do you mean by 'transformation'?" Alex panted. He leaped another gap between roofs and stumbled a little on the landing. He might have been better than the average super-soldier, but even he had limits. "Are you saying there's a way to reverse this?"

_There isn't_ , Zeus snapped. Then, almost apologetically, he added,  _Not to my knowledge._

"Then what the hell?"

_Do you want him to be in pain?_

"No, but I-"

_Do you like seeing him suffer?_

"No! But-"

_Then feed the man!_

"Fuck you!" Alex roared. He dug his heels into the next roof he landed on, sending debris flying everywhere. "Fuck  _you_ , fuck  _him_ , fuck  _all of this_!" He walked to the edge of the building and tried to toss the assassin over, but his arms suddenly burned with exhaustion and fell to his sides. " _Fuck!_ " Alex snarled. He tried to throw himself off the roof, but was locked into place, betrayed by his own body. Or, more accurately, sabotaged by a voice in his head.

Alex screamed in wordless rage and frustration, and when he ran out of breath, he fell to his knees, hung his head, and just trembled.

"Why are you doing this to me?"

_Keeping you from killing a man for no reason? Hmm, I wonder._

"You've never stopped me before!" he cried. "What do you want from me? Why are you here?" He shrugged the assassin off his shoulders and held his face in his hands. "Why do you even care about this guy?"

Zeus hesitated for a long moment, and when he spoke, it was in such a timid voice that Alex had difficulty understanding the words.  _I like him. He's been kind to us._

This sudden shift from a cocky douchebag with the libido of a nymphomaniac to this submissive, child-like attitude threw Alex for a loop, and the only thing he could think to say was, "I like him too…."

Silence yawned between them, giving Alex plenty of time to stew in that realization. Of course he liked the guy, he was honorable, kind when he wanted to be, and stubborn as sin. Barring the last, they were complete opposites. Yet when Alex thought about the assassin, he felt more than camaraderie. Christ, he felt  _responsible_  for the man. He'd been in such a hurry to find a way to fix what he'd done-

_What_  I  _did,_ Zeus corrected reluctantly.

-what  _Zeus_  had done, that he'd been blinded to the consequences of his actions. He'd trusted Cross and put his own life in jeopardy for a lead that took him to a dead end.

"Fuck," Alex breathed. "I don't just like him...I  _like_  him." He twisted around to look at the unconscious man and shook his head in disbelief. "Do I even like guys?"

_At this point, if you kiss someone and you don't accidentally eat them, you should call it a win-regardless of gender._

"Thank you for that oh-so-helpful observation," Alex said dryly. "You're an irreplaceable asset."

_Banter later; feed him now, or you'll never get to find out if you like guys or not._

The thought left Alex shaken, and it took him a couple of tries to stand. He realized, after he stumbled over nothing, that he wasn't completely in control of his limbs.

"I could steer better without a backseat driver," he said pointedly.

_Oh, what? S-sorry…._

How the hell he had ended up with first-year Neville Longbottom in his head was beyond him, but Alex was too exhausted to put much thought into the matter. He hadn't had a good night's sleep in-well, as far as he knew ever, but he was itching for a bed and a pillow.

He wouldn't have a chance to look for somewhere to sleep for a while, though, because there was still a gaping hole in Altaïr's chest, and the other man was still missing half the meat on his foot.

Alex looked over the edge of the roof and felt the muscles in his lower back tense, as if he was about to throw himself back from the ledge.

"Relax, I'm not gonna do anything stupid."

_What are you going to do, then?_

"I'm gonna go get him a fuckin' hamburger."

 

When Altaïr surfaced from unconsciousness, the sun was high enough in the sky to let him study where he was. He lay on a rooftop, surrounded on all sides by taller buildings. He didn't have energy enough to do more than turn his head a fraction of an inch to each side, and even that was almost too much effort. Each breath was agony, and the metallic taste of his own blood made him feel horribly nauseous.

_God, give me strength to endure this pain. Forgive my transgressions and lend me your strength, for I am your faithful vessel._  He prayed in silence and watched the lightening sky chase the stars toward the far horizon. Was Maria watching those same lights? Did she look up at the sky and wonder where he'd gone? Did she even notice his absence?

He decided that the fear of being forgotten by those he held dear was a far worse suffering than any physical ailment.

A loud scraping sound and two  _thumps,_  followed by disjointed groaning, pulled Altaïr from his reverie, and he turned his head just enough to watch Alex walk into his field of vision.

"Good to see you haven't kicked the bucket yet," he said.

Altaïr grimaced and tried to raise an arm to shade his eyes from the rising sun, but his body would not respond to his commands.

"I do not understand your obsession with buckets," he croaked. "Where are we?"

"Still in Manhattan, in case you were getting your hopes up." He crouched on the balls of his feet, balancing beside Altaïr and a little to his left to shade him from the light. "What happened? Why were you in that elevator?"

"I was taking a moment to review my options and choose the best course of action to take when one of those...things...got into the apartment."

Alex cocked a brow and grinned. "You were hiding," he said.

"Tactical consideration," Altaïr agreed. He winced and suppressed another cough. Was this what it felt like to die? It was certainly as painful as his previous encounters with death, but with a wound as severe as this, he should have bled out hours ago.

"Hey, I need you to stay awake," Alex said loudly, patting his cheek. "I've got something that'll help you heal."

Altaïr blinked his eyes open-when had he closed them?-and groaned softly.

"What did you say?" Alex asked.

"You left me in that room," the assassin said. He bared his teeth in a grimace and looked up at the sky again. He found no solace in the cold blue heavens, and he instead met Alex's eyes. They seemed different from the last time he'd seen them, more haggard and haunted. Alex seemed to have aged a decade in one short night.

"Trust me," Alex said with a small, strange smile. "If I'd stayed, you wouldn't have liked what happened."

"I believe you," Altaïr said, and it surprised him that it was the truth. "What happened in the hallway? Back in that building…?"

"Let's worry about that later. Right now, we're gonna get you patched up." He stood and walked away, returning a moment later dragging something behind him. "Close your eyes."

"What? Why?"

"Just do it, would you?" Alex snapped. He waited until Altaïr had closed his eyes before muttering, "Stubborn ass."

"I am injured, not deaf."

"Good, then listen up. For this to work, I need you to imagine something you would normally eat. Something you really like."

Altaïr raised a skeptical brow, but was in too much pain to question it. He imagined the best meal he'd ever eaten, a platter one of his brothers had pinched from a noble they'd been staking out for the majority of a week. It had been a waterfowl shipped from the coast and prepared with the most delicious sauce Altaïr had ever tasted. He never thought oranges could be so sweet when compared to the hard lumps of citrus he was used to suffering through to flavor the bland meat of winter goats and sheep. When he'd questioned the color of the barley that cradled the bird, he'd been told the golden color was from steeping the cereal in saffron, a spice that was so ludicrously expensive Altaïr had scarcely heard the word uttered, let alone seen what it looked like. He remembered the rich flavors and scents, the tenderness of the meat as he shared it with his fellows. It was his first-and last-taste of bird flesh.

Mouth-watering as the memory might have been, it didn't distract the assassin so much that he missed Alex placing something warm and very much alive in his hand. He jerked his arm away, his eyes snapping open in an instant. "What is that?" he demanded.

Alex, who looked as if he'd been caught doing something naughty, looked away. "You need to eat," he said evasively. "If you eat, you'll heal."

"My knowledge of medicinal practices may be minimal, but I am certain that there's no correlation between what I eat and how my body heals wounds," Altaïr argued. "Tell me what you are doing."

Alex set his jaw, a dangerous look entering his eyes. "You wanna know what I'm doing?"

"Yes," Altaïr said, exasperated. "That's what I've been saying."

"Fine, I'll show you." He bent down and grabbed Altaïr under his shoulders, dragging him across the roof to prop him up against a large metal box that protruded from the building.

The assassin swore viciously and nearly fell unconscious again when he sagged against the box. As his vision slowly returned, he watched Alex drag a man into his field of vision. The man was unconscious, and he wore camouflage clothing like that of the Blackwatch uniforms. His hair was black, peppered with streaks of silver. There was also an enormous gash on the side of his head that bled profusely.

"Watch closely, because this other one's for you," Alex said. He grabbed the man by the hair on top of his head and held him up. One arm twitched and writhed, then transformed smoothly into a mass of what looked like red and black lightning. That is, if lighting could wrap around a man's throat and slip into his nose, eyes, mouth and ears.

There was a sickening  _crunch_ , and the mass encircled the soldier's skull. Within minutes, his head was gone, and a moment later, Alex had consumed the entire body.

Altaïr watched dispassionately, unable to muster the strength to even feel disgusted. He expected Alex to gloat when he finished, expected him to boast of how easy it was for him to kill, to end a life. To his relief, his expectations were not met.

When the last vestiges of the body were gone, Alex's arm returned to its natural state. He hadn't even had time to lower it before he gripped his hair in both fists and let out a strangled cry of pain. He fell to his knees, gripping his head as if it was about to fly off of his shoulders. His chest heaved, and he grunted and whimpered in pain, rocking back and forth in his fit.

He knelt there for a subjective eternity until his arms fell to his sides and he stared at the featureless rooftop. Tears gathered in his eyes and fell slowly down his cheeks.

"Who's Elizabeth Greene?" he whispered.


	13. Mending Fences, Breaking Faces

Alex knelt there on the roof, staring at the gravel beneath him. He was utterly speechless, incapable of forming even a simple thought. The images that flashed through his mind made him twitch and flinch, but he was otherwise still as words, unbidden, passed his lips. 

“Who’s Elizabeth Greene?” 

Hearing the name aloud made him want to cower in fear and praise the heavens at the same time. It was a chorus of angels’ voices and a thousand cats scratching the largest blackboard in the world. Five syllables made his mind tremble and his bowels turn watery. 

“You’re crying,” a deadpan voice said. 

He raised his eyes to settle on Altaïr’s pale, sweating face, and he frowned in confusion. He touched his own cheek, and his fingers came away wet. He smiled shakily and said, “So I am.” 

 _What was that?_ Zeus asked in a voice that trembled. _What...who is she…?_  

“I don’t know,” Alex said, shaking his head. “But Blackwatch has her.” Something about that statement angered him, made him want to disembowel those who would dare to lay a hand on this woman he had never even seen.  

Through the anger, he saw Altaïr’s expression change from wariness to weary fear, as if he had become so accustomed to the adrenaline and heightened senses that it was now a chore to be afraid. The assassin grimaced as more blood trickled from the wound in his chest, and he labored to breathe. 

Alex shook himself and came to his feet. “We need to hurry up. We have somewhere we need to be.” 

“I don’t want...to go,” Altaïr wheezed. 

“I’m not leaving you somewhere to get chewed on again,” Alex said, but his words had no force, no conviction; they just hung in the air, waiting to be heard. 

“No,” the assassin coughed, “I don’t want...to go...with you.” He met Alex’s gaze, and although he looked like something death would cough up after a particularly dairy-rich meal, there was a heat in his eyes that made Alex rather nervous. It was a reflection of the prideful man that he’d handcuffed to his bed not so long ago. In that moment, Alex realized what he was so attracted to in this man. It wasn’t his body or even his mind, it was the purpose that drove him. The experience and the weight of his life that kindled the heat and passion in those eyes. And now, those eyes were watching him as if he was about to attack. 

“Don’t be such a baby,” Alex said quietly. He walked over to the second soldier he’d brought to the roof and grabbed the man by the collar of his shirt.  

In a blur of motion, the soldier twisted himself like a cat and kicked Alex’s legs out from under him. The man flipped himself over, and when Alex grabbed his ankle, he twisted around and kicked him squarely in the nose. 

“Fuck!” Alex snarled. Blood poured from his nose in the instant before the break healed, splattering the gravel beneath them. He wiped the blood from his lips and snarled, “Okay. Now I’m pissed.” He sat up and dug his fingers into the soldier’s calf, garnering some small satisfaction from the man’s cries of pain. He stood and dragged the bastard backward, ignoring his panicked sobs.  

“No,” Altaïr said fiercely. “No, absolutely not.” 

“Who’s the one with a hole in his chest?” Alex snapped. At the reproachful look Altaïr gave him, he knew the assassin understood. He grabbed the hair on the the top of the soldier’s head and pulled him up. Then, before he could really think about what he was about to do, he pushed his fingers into the wound on the man’s scalp, sliding them under the skin along the smooth skull beneath. The soldier howled in agony, spittle flying from his lips until his eyes rolled back in his head. He collapsed, unconscious again, and Alex met Altaïr’s gaze.  

“Was that necessary?”  

“No, but it made me feel a little better,” Alex lied, ignoring the voice that jibbered in hysterics in the back of his head. It wasn’t Zeus...it was his own conscience. But he rarely had time to consider that part of himself anymore, so he tucked it away in a dark recess of his mind to let it have its fit. He’d deal with it later.  

“I won’t do it,” Altaïr said firmly. 

If he’d had enough energy to be irritated, he would have been. Instead, he met the older man’s eyes and said plainly, “I’ll rephrase, then. I can’t carry you all around Manhattan, toting you from building to building until you heal on your own. If you do this, you’ll most likely heal in a few seconds.” 

Confusion clouded the assassin’s gaze, and he shook his head the barest fraction of an inch. “I don’t understand,” he said in a thready voice. He was obviously in great pain, but was either too stubborn or too prideful—likely both—to understand that Alex was trying to help him. “you want me to kill this man?” 

“That’s usually how it goes,” Alex agreed. “You could take just enough to heal yourself. The wounds are small enough that it wouldn’t take much...but you don’t want to. You can never be sure what you’ll take and when. Could take his liver, or a lung...maybe part of his heart.  

The confusion gave way to frustration and uncertainty, and Altaïr demanded, “What are you saying? Why are you saying these things? I am not like you, Alex. I cannot kill a man and...and….” 

“And what?” Alex challenged tiredly. “Eat him? Use his life to fuel my own?” He snorted humorlessly and said, “Isn’t that what people do every day all around the world?” 

“People do not eat each other,” Altaïr pressed. “Savages do!” 

 _Savages_ , Alex thought. _Kinda like the ring of that one. What do you think?_  

There was no response other than a quavering uneasiness that made Alex’s skin crawl and made his stomach flip nervously.  

“We’re not people,” he said. “Not anymore, anyway. I don’t really know what we are, but it’s nothing good. Especially not if we have to eat people to survive.” 

A sickened look darkened Altaïr’s expression, and he asked, “Why do you keep saying we, Alex?” Tears gathered in his eyes, and his face twisted into a sudden expression of indignant fury. “What happened in that hallway, Alex?” 

So he told him. He told him about the river, about almost drowning, and about Cross pulling him out and trying to save him. He carefully omitted the part where Zeus practically orgasmed while he infected Altaïr and finished the recollection with, “When that was all said and done, I was so hungry, I would have eaten anything.” He looked down at the rooftop and said almost ashamedly, “Even you.” 

Uncomfortable silence yawned between them, and Alex squirmed under the pressure of it. Something in the back of his head kept telling him that he had to go, that he had somewhere to be very soon. And if he didn’t get there in time, he just knew that something truly awful was going to happen. He had to stop it, he had to. 

“I know you’re angry with me, but there was nothing I could do. It was either that, or let you die, and—” 

Something hit the side of his jaw, making it crack painfully, but not so badly that it would break. He rubbed his jaw out of reflex as Altaïr sagged back against the air conditioning unit, his fist still tight and his face pasty white as he tried to ride out the pain he’d just caused himself.  

“D-Didn’t have...a choice…,” the assassin panted, “...my ass.” He bared his teeth in an agonized grimace, and Alex noted they were stained red with blood. He reached forward as if to help Altaïr sit up, but the man passed out before he could. 

“Jesus Christ,” Alex sighed, shaking his head. “That couldn’t have gone any worse.” He was fairly certain that it could have indeed gone much, much worse, and that he should feel lucky that the assassin was too injured to come after him with any sort of accuracy. 

Regardless, he didn’t have time to sit around waiting for permission, and he was still convinced that an important deadline was nearing.  

He grabbed one of the soldier’s arms and then took Altaïr’s hand, holding them both tight. Then he closed his eyes and focused on what he was about to do. By rights—and logic, for that matter—this shouldn’t have been possible, but Alex had never submitted to the idea that what he wanted to do and what was possible existed in separate realities.  

“Alright man, we’re gonna have to work together here,” he sighed. “You gotta help me out. Don’t fight.” He squeezed the assassin’s hand and started to consume the soldier. At the same time, he turned his attention to Altaïr, imagining their palms becoming one. He felt a warm tingling in his hand and shuddered when he felt the connection. It was hard to split his attention enough to consume the soldier and not the assassin, but with a grunt of effort, he finished the man off and pushed the energy through his body. He bared his teeth in concentration, picturing the energy as warmth spreading from his arm, through his shoulder, into his torso, and down his opposite arm into Altaïr. 

The assassin gasped, but didn’t wake. His fingers spasmed, and pain radiated up Alex’s arm. The bastard was trying to eat him! 

“Oh come on, that’s just rude,” he panted. He pushed back against the pressure, forcing the last vestiges of the meal out of his body. Once he was sure it would stick, he pulled his hand back, hissing in pain as their fused skin tore apart.  

The wounds Altaïr had suffered healed slowly at first, tissues and skin lacing together in tight layers. Within thirty seconds, the wounds were completely healed, going so far as to stitch the man’s shirt closed and reconstruct his shoe. 

A tense moment later, Altaïr’s eyes slowly opened, and he blinked several times. His brows knit together in confusion, and he asked, “What happened?” He started to sit up, hesitated as if expecting it to hurt, and looked down at his torso when it didn’t. His eyes widened, and he looked at Alex. “What did you do!” 

“Calm down,” Alex said sternly. “You needed to heal, so I--” 

“You bastard!” Altaïr snarled. He came to his feet in one fluid motion and attacked Alex. The assassin feinted a blow at his head and buried a fist in his stomach. The blow drove the breath out of him, and he didn’t even have time to straighten up before Altaïr pile-drove a knee into his chin, breaking several of his teeth. 

“Fughk!” Alex squawked, reeling back both in shock and an attempt to give himself a moment to catch up. The damage healed almost as soon as it’d been inflicted, but the rapid strikes were confusing, disorienting, and even with all of Alex’s strength and speed, he got his ass handed to him in a fifteen-second bout with a trained fighter.  

“You killed two men!” Altaïr shouted as he strode across the rooftop. “And you show nothing! Not even as shred of remorse!” 

Something about that accusation hit too close to home, and Alex immediately jumped on the defensive. “How the fuck do you know what I’m thinking? You don’t know anything about me.” He shoved the assassin away, resisting the urge to deck him. “You don’t know how I feel about the shit I do!” 

“I know that when a man ends another man’s life, he shouldn’t _smile_ ,” Altaïr said so fiercely that his voice trembled.  

Alex opened his mouth to retort, but found no words to speak. Did he smile when he killed? He couldn’t remember ever choosing to do so, but...he recalled the pleasure he’d felt when Zeus infected the man before him, and he recoiled in revulsion. What was he becoming? 

“Jesus,” Alex sighed. He rubbed his face with his hands and took a step back. “Okay, look. I know you’re pissed—” 

“You know nothing!” Altaïr snarled. “I have lived my life according to three rules. A creed that is the very core of my being.” The anger that lit his eyes was a shade away from blind rage, and his voice shook when he continued, “And one of those rules commands that I stay my blade from the flesh of innocents. In forcing this decision upon me, you have spat in the face of that which I hold dear.”  

“Well technically,” Alex said—and it should be worth mentioning that at this point, his brain recognized the train wreck and tried to stop it, but his mouth just kept chugging along—with a hesitant, almost sheepish grin, “you didn’t use a blade. I acted like a transistor and—” 

He tried to block the sudden attack, but Altaïr was, again, too fast. The assassin snarled in rage and grabbed the front of his jacket. Without even a heartbeat of hesitation, Altaïr headbutted Alex so hard in the nose that he felt the bridge of his upper jaw break. The pain literally blinded him, and he didn’t notice he was falling until he hit the street below. It took his body a few agonized seconds to sort out the damage, and only once he had healed did he feel the weight of another man on top of him. The weight that was groaning in pain. 

“Oh, for fuck’s sake!” Alex shouted. “You didn’t let go when you shoved me off the building? What kind of assassin are you!” 

Altaïr lifted himself slowly, setting his hands on either side of Alex’s shoulders to do so. “A damned good one,” he groaned, “though I admit, I am as shocked as you are that I lived through my youth. I was even more reckless then.”  

“I couldn’t have guessed,” Alex said blandly. “Now, if you’re finished, get the hell off of me.” 

The assassin gave him what likely was supposed to be a withering look, but the effect of the expression was lessened when they had to untangle their limbs and work together to stand. 

“You’re lucky you landed on top of me,” Alex snapped. “That was a twelve-story drop. I didn’t just get the pulp beat out of me for you to go and break some more bones.” 

“I’m still angry with you,” Altaïr growled, “but I believe it would be prudent for us to leave.” 

“And why do you think that?” Alex asked nastily. 

Instead of speaking, the assassin pointed toward the other end of the street, where a low grumbling had been growing steadily louder. Gathered at the far end of the sidewalk, a group of infected watched them with heavy-lidded, heady eyes, drunk on the anticipation of the chase.  

“Yup, that’s a pretty good reason,” Alex sighed.  

“Why aren’t they attacking?” Altaïr asked. 

“They don’t want to mess up my pretty face?” Alex suggested. “I don’t know, shut up and come on.” 

As soon as they started walking, the infected started snarling and braying as they gave chase. The two men fell into a run, but the twists and turns of Manhattan’s streets slowed them down too much. 

“We can’t keep running at your pace,” Alex said. “Pick up your feet, or you’re gonna end up as a chew toy again.” 

“Where are we going?” Altaïr panted. “I cannot sprint like this for long.”  

“Christ, are you good for anything?” Alex muttered, rolling his eyes. He grabbed the front of Altaïr’s shirt and flung him down an alley. “Climb the building. There’s a fire escape you can use to—” 

He hadn’t even rounded the corner before Altaïr grabbed a pipe as thick around as his wrist and ripped it off the building to their left. “You go. I’ve grown tired of running,” the older man said. He twirled the pipe in a slow circle, testing the weight of it as he shook out his limbs. Before Alex could protest, the first of the infected skidded around the corner and barreled into the alley. It lunged for Altaïr, mouth gaping, saliva flying from its jaws, and was met with a vicious swing of the pipe. The metal shattered the creature’s teeth, nearly folded its skull in half, and sent it howling out of the alley. 

Three more of the monsters streamed toward them, and Alex watched Altaïr dispatch them. He moved like a dervish, swinging the pipe with enough force to, in some revolting cases, burst pustules of infection and even crush skulls. His body strained and stretched, his muscles moving in fluid grace as if he’d spent his entire life caving in skulls and shattering the bones of his enemies. For all Alex knew, that was exactly what he’d spent his life doing. This man wasn’t some docile pup that sat around begging for scraps from scholars, this was a man who trained for battle, who honed his body and mind for the purpose of destruction just such as this. Despite how vehemently he denied it, Altaïr was an assassin—a killer through and through. 

A snarl that didn’t come from the throat of one of the infected drew Alex’s attention, and he shook his head. Why was he just standing there? He should be helping. He started forward, but found himself locked in place. 

 _Wait_ , Zeus said quietly. _Let him find himself_. 

 _This isn’t some guru, self-help bullshit_ , Alex shot back. _I don’t know if he can be killed, and I’d rather not find out._

 _Thirty seconds,_ Zeus said. _Give him that, and if he needs us, you can help him._           

Although Alex didn’t like the idea, he agreed and, instead of interfering, stood there feeling like a fool. Yet, even as he watched Altaïr beat the infected back, he slowly realized the assassin didn’t need his help. The pipe was bent and twisted by now, and when it came too warped to use, Altaïr threw it away and attacked with his bare hands. He roared in challenge to the beasts that surrounded him and pummeled them with sharp jabs of his fists, swift kicks that made his attackers howl in pain. And when he tired, his strikes became less coordinated, less flourishing, but no less fierce. If anything, Altaïr became more savage as time wore on.  

The stream of infected puttered out before long, and just as the last decided it would be smarter to retreat, Altaïr grabbed the beast by the throat and hauled it off its feet. He shouted wordlessly, and with a wild look in his eye, he plunged his hand into the infected’s belly. It squealed in pain, writhing as blood and worse leaked from around Altaïr’s wrist. It took only a moment, and it was messy, but the assassin consumed the infected, leaving only a thick puddle of ichor at his feet. 

They stood there in the alley, silent but for Altaïr’s ragged breathing. After a subjective lifetime had passed, Alex cleared his throat softly and said, “I’ve done a lot of stupid shit in my life...that was by far the dumbest brave thing I’ve ever seen another man do.” 

Without even the ghost of a smile to hint at whether or not Altaïr had heard him, the assassin turned and walked away.  

“Where are you going?” Alex called after him. When the other man ignored him, he cursed and jogged to catch up, trying not to splash through the remains of the battle that had just taken place. He pulled ahead of Altaïr and placed his hand on his shoulder, starting to ask, “Hey, what happened back there--” 

Altaïr spun around, grabbed Alex by the throat, slammed him against the alley wall and leaned in so close that their faces were a bare inch apart. Alex could feel the warmth of the assassin’s breath on his lips, and in what must have been the worst timing in the history of man, he felt his pants shrink several sizes around his groin.  

“The only reason I have tolerated you thus far,” Altaïr said in a calm and quiet voice, “is because I needed you. Now that you’ve given me this power, that ceases to be the case. I’m faster, stronger, and more capable than I have ever been. I believe the end of our relationship has come at last.” He broke eye contact with Alex to lean forward and breathe against his ear, “And if you touch me again without my permission, I will demonstrate on each of your limbs why armies retreated and kings bent their knees to my people.” 

As abruptly as the moment had begun, it ended, and Alex was left leaning against the alley wall, breathing hard and feeling rather hot under the collar. He touched his neck where Altaïr had grabbed him, shivering at the lingering warmth there. 

He watched Altaïr walk away and grimaced as a pit of despair formed in his chest. He couldn’t just let Altaïr leave...not now, not after everything he’d done to help him. Not, at least, until he had a chance to work out his feelings toward this violent, stubborn, asshole of a man. 

 _Give me control,_ Zeus said suddenly. His voice was urgent, as if he’d just hatched a plan.  

_Hell no, last time I let you—_

_Do you want him to leave? Hurry up! He’s getting away!_

Alex hesitated, unsure if it was wise to let Zeus take over. Even if he had all the time in the world, he couldn’t have listed all the reasons this was a bad plan, not the least of which was the idea of loosing this madman on Manhattan.  

 _I’ll give control back as soon as I stop him,_ Zeus said hurriedly. _I’m not strong enough to fight you. If I do something you don’t like, you can stop me._

That was as close to a guarantee as he was going to get, and it was the the best he could hope for. So, with no small amount of apprehension, Alex surrendered control of his body and took the back seat. 

 

 

He’d been rash, too quick to act. It was like he’d been thrust back in time to Solomon’s temple and was rushing Robert de Sable again. The shame of that hasty decision weighed heavily on Altaïr’s mind as he walked away from the only man who had shown him any kindness in this time. 

He hadn’t been lying about being capable enough to strike out on his own, but it was less a question of ability, and more about efficiency. If he was going to find a way home in any kind of timely manner, he needed someone who knew the area, knew the time’s technology. Hell, he needed someone who knew the culture. If he went around questioning people, would he be met with hostility? He had no way to know. Alex would be able to talk to the locals, get them to open up one way or another—

That idea derailed his train of thought, and his lip curled in a sour expression. Alex would get the information, alright. By any means necessary. Even if necessary meant killing for no good reason. How many lives had to end before Altaïr recognized Alex for what he was? Had he truly allowed himself to be so blinded by culture shock that he could look at Alex and see him as anything but what he was? A killer, a mad man, a manipulator of the highest order, and Altaïr had ignored it all. What kind of man, especially one who held God’s ideals so close to heart, could stand aside and just watch as countless people were slaughtered? What kind of person could idly observe as an abomination such as Alex Mercer swept the streets of this city? 

Altaïr stopped in his tracks and stared at the concrete, as if it would come to life and give him the answers he needed. When no such divination occurred, he chewed his lip and closed his eyes. What would he do if he was in his own time and a man was murdering people left and right? He certainly wouldn’t stand aside and watch him do it. 

 _You know exactly what you would do,_ a niggling voice in the back of his head said. _You just don’t want to say it._

Truly he did know, and the voice was right. He didn’t want to think of what he would do, because he knew that it was a permanent solution to a temporary problem. This wasn’t his time, nor was it his life. Why should he care about lives that would never impact his own? The thought alone made his face burn with shame, and he discarded it immediately. Of course he needed to solve this problem, it didn’t matter whose lives it affected, Alex Mercer needed to die. 

 _How do you know you could do it?_ the voice challenged.  

Altaïr bristled at the insult and grimaced in irritation. Had he not proven himself again and again in battle? Why did no one believe what he was capable of? 

 _I’ve become complacent,_ he thought. _My judgment is compromised. I no longer know what is and is not right…._ The realization stole his breath like a cold, winter breeze, and he had to lean against the wall beside him so he wouldn’t fall. For so long, he had been firm in his beliefs and values. To have that stripped away so suddenly was like having warm covers ripped from his naked body and being plunged into frigid waters.  

 _Good God,_ the voice mocked, _you’d think the world was ending because you didn’t say no to the bad guy for once._

Altaïr didn’t have time to question the voice or why it was mocking him before he heard hurried footsteps behind him. He turned to see Alex skid to a halt five feet away, and he took a cautious step back. The other man’s eyes were wide, his lips were parted slightly as if to speak, but he said nothing. His expression twisted in series of emotions and finally settled on terror seconds before he closed the distance between them.  

The assassin raised his arms as if to defend himself, but felt no pain, no blows to counter. Instead, Alex grabbed his face with a hand on each of his cheeks, and a moment later, Altaïr felt gentle pressure on his lips. He was...he was being kissed? 

Altaïr froze in pure confusion. Had he not just threatened to do horrible things to this man if he so much as laid a hand on him again? And not five minutes later, the maniac was kissing him! He didn’t know what to be outraged about, the denseness Alex was exhibiting, the audacity in the act itself, or the fact that he was so arrogant as to think something like this would be acceptable.  

When Alex pulled away—because he was the one to pull away first, Altaïr was still too stunned—he avoided the assassin’s gaze and instead stared at his chest.  

“I know someone who can get the Apple to work,” he said suddenly. And without even waiting for a reaction, he plowed on, “If you stay, I’ll help you get home. If you go...there’s no guarantee you’ll ever get off this island.” 

In the wake of his words, silence stretched between them. Neither dared to speak, because neither knew what to say. Altaïr watched uncertainty flicker behind Alex’s wide, blue eyes, and something like fear followed close behind. Then, without warning, he stretched up and tried to kiss Altaïr again. 

The assassin reached around to grab the hair on the back of Alex’s skull and wrenched his head back. The other man’s face contorted in fear, then went slack. Any emotion drained from his expression, and his eye suddenly fluttered closed as he became docile and limp.  

Altaïr grimaced and wanted to pull away, but Alex’s fingers were locked in his shirt with a dead man’s grip. He had just started to pry the man’s fingers up when they loosened and finally released. He met Alex’s eyes from inches away and frowned. They were different now, not afraid or uncertain, rather challenging, as if they dared Altaïr to make a move. 

“I just kissed you,” Alex said, and it was more statement than question. 

“Yes,” Altaïr said. 

“That actually happened? I didn’t just imagine it?” 

Altaïr cocked a brow and asked, “Do you often fantasize about kissing me in dark alleys?” 

The beginnings of smile crossed the other man’s lips, and he finally met Altaïr’s eyes. “Don’t suppose it’d make a difference if I did?” 

Altaïr, who had still been deciding whether or not to take offence to the unsolicited embrace, felt his amusement drain away. What exactly was Alex expecting? Praise? Did he want Altaïr to pat him on the head for a job well done? 

 _I’m married!_ Altaïr thought, though he didn’t trust his voice not to break if he spoke those particular words aloud. _On top of that, I am a_ _man_ _of God. I will not risk a pyre for anything this man could offer me._  

This _man_ , the petulant voice hissed. This _man_ , this _man_ , only _this man? I see another, younger, less experienced, certainly closer to your heart—_

 _Malik was different_ , Altaïr thought snappishly. _You would do well not to mention him again._

He remembered the nights they had spent together in Jerusalem, shrouded in blankets and mounds of pillows to stave off the cold desert nights. He remembered whispered promises that this time would be their last as they shared passionate breaths and wild fantasies of leaving together, never to return. They’d been indoctrinated into this war by birth and had known nothing else—no matter what they wished, they could never leave. 

Yet when he recalled those nights, he longed to return to them, to the moments after when he could clean himself up and leave if he so chose, to the freedom he so craved to make his own decisions and have them affect no one but himself. He had been a ‘man of God’ for so long that he’d forgotten the pleasures of throwing caution to the wind. Perhaps for good reason… 

Could he allow himself this brief lapse of faith? His better judgment had already abandoned him, why should he not take advantage of it? 

 _Would He forgive me?_ he wondered, glancing at the sky. 

_The big guy’s got more pressing issues nowadays than worrying about where you stick your—_

“While it makes no difference how often you imagine me at your disposal,” Altaïr said much too loudly, “the only thing I must insist on is that you keep your kisses to yourself.” He released Alex’s hair with a little shove and stepped back. 

Alex stumbled and caught himself on a light pole, turning back to study Altaïr with quizzical eyes. He grimaced when Altaïr didn't come after him, and it took the assassin unbuttoning his jeans for him to understand what was happening. "Here?" he asked, pointing at the ground. 

"Where else?" Altaïr said. 

Apprehension flickered through Alex's eyes, and that same fear from before returned. "Now?" 

Irritation made Altaïr's voice harsher than was appropriate, and he growled, "Yes, now." 

The other man opened his mouth as if to speak, closed it, and glanced over his shoulder. "I...I need to be somewhere. I mean, I-I...can't we do it later?" 

Altaïr's eyes narrowed, and he reached out to grab Alex's jacket. "No," he said. "Now, or never. You have thrown me around, gotten me shot, abandoned me and coerced me into killing. That is more than anyone has ever gotten away with where I am concerned. Now, it's my turn."

“What the fuck do you mean ‘it’s my turn’? What are you—ow! Hey! This isn’t how this works, you bastard.” Even as Alex protested, Altaïr hooked a foot around the other’s knee and gave a sharp tug. Alex sucked in a pained breath when his knees hit the ground, but he was stunned into silence when he Altaïr opened his jeans and pulled himself out. The astonishment vanished, giving way to indignity. He demanded, “And just what do you want me to do with that?”

“Have you never seen one before?” Altaïr said. “You were the one complaining of places to be, and you started all of this with your unsolicited kiss! So either do it quickly or deny me so we can leave.”

Alex stared up at him for a subjective lifetime, uncertainty clouding his expression. He clearly wanted to, but either lacked the knowledge or the conviction to do so. This was made ever more apparent when he reached out and clumsily grabbed hold of the assassin’s body.

“You truly never have,” Altaïr said, certain now.

Obviously flustered, Alex readjusted his grip and started moving his hand. “I haven’t exactly had the time or reason to do anything like this, so forgive me if I’m not the Da Vinci of handjobs.”

“Then don’t use your hands,” Altaïr said gruffly. He batted the other’s hand away and stepped forward to corner him against the building behind them. He leaned an arm against the alley wall and looked down at Alex, who looked like he was about to have a fit.

“I-I don’t know if I can do this, man,” he stammered nervously. He tried to slip out from between Altaïr and the wall, but the assassin threaded strong fingers through his hair and guided him back.

“You’re a smart boy,” Altaïr said dismissively. “I’m sure you can figure it out.”

Alex peered up the line of Altaïr’s body, but the eyes that met his did not belong to the man at his feet. They were different, and significantly so. The color was the same, but their weight had changed, there was no haughty defiance, none of the arrogance or anger Altaïr had come to associate with the younger man. The expression on Alex’s face was one of uncertainty and…resignation? He’d resigned himself to this? He didn’t want it.

 _Of course he doesn’t want it,_ another voice in his head all but shouted in his ear. _You’re insane!_

 _I have never been more in my right mind,_ Altaïr snapped in reply.

_You’re a killer from another millennia, and you’ve cornered him in an alley with your cock in his face. Does that sound like something a sane person would do?_

He wanted to argue, but this voice—unlike the countless others whose numbers seemed to grow every time he turned his back—had a point. A normal person would not do this, would not expect something like this because of something as insignificant as a kiss. God, what if Alex hadn’t meant anything by it in the first place? It wasn’t odd for men to show affection toward each other, perhaps by kissing him, it was Alex’s way of saying he cared about him? The look on his face surely didn’t speak to wanting anything more.

Altaïr sighed in annoyance, and just as Alex had taken his member in hand and was about to start, the assassin pulled back. “Don’t,” he said.

“What? Why?” Alex asked, trying not to sound relieved.

“Get up,” Altaïr ordered as he tucked himself away in his jeans. He zipped them up carefully, wary of the metal teeth so near his unmentionables. “We’re leaving.”

“Wait, I’m confused,” the younger man said, “one minute you’re throwing me around and pinning me against walls, the next you’re Mr. Manners and giving me an option? What the hell?”

“I don’t believe indignation is the appropriate response for someone in your position,” Altaïr said. “Now if you’re quite finished, we clearly have somewhere we need to be.”

Alex shot him an unfriendly look, but didn’t argue.

 

 

If Alex had been less fanatical about this deadline, he would have demanded a do-over. Because whatever had just happened between him and Altaïr had left him _very_ unsatisfied. He had reasserted dominance over Zeus while the assassin readjusted his clothes, and he stood in the alley trying to ignore the complaints from his nether regions and failing miserably.

Yet even as he entertained thoughts of grabbing the assassin and throwing him down on the ground, his frustrations were swept away by an urgency unlike anything he’d ever felt. It was like he could feel someone holding a gun aimed at his head and was just waiting for them to pull the trigger. It was maddening, like he could feel impending doom zeroing in on him.

“So,” Altaïr sighed. “Where are we going?”

Alex shook his head as he tried to think past the near-panic. “I…don’t know. It’s just this feeling, like something horrible’s going to happen.”

“Is this feeling pointing in a direction?” the assassin prompted.

“Sure, let me pull out my vague-feeling compass,” he shot back. “Just shut up and give me a minute to think, you asshole.”

Altaïr didn’t make another wisecrack, but Alex was certain he’d pay for the insult later. In the meantime, he closed his eyes and pictured the city in his mind’s eye. God knew he’d spent enough time on the rooftops to have a decent mental map of the place, but it was cloudy in the parts he hadn’t often visited, appearing as a bright, ghostly blue or red according to which areas were and were not safe. He focused on these areas, trying to pinpoint where the distress signal was coming from.

One area seemed particularly bright, but he doubted it could be coming from there…that was right in the middle of a military zone. In fact, if he remembered right, that was…that was the Gentek building.

“Aw fuck,” he sighed.

“What?” Altaïr demanded.

Alex leaned his head back and stood there for a moment, regretting every damned decision that had led him to this moment.

“We have to go to the Gentek building,” he groaned.

“What is that?” Altaïr asked.

“The last place in the city either of us should go anywhere near,” he said.

Before Altaïr could make any snide remarks about how they could go anywhere they damn well pleased, Alex said, “Let’s get this over with so I can get some sleep. I’m dead on my feet over here. Come on.”

The Gentek building was about twenty blocks away from where they had started, but the distance meant nothing to either of them. Altaïr obviously still had issues with running quickly over long distances, but he kept the vigorous pace Alex set so that it only took them a few minutes to reach the building.

As they neared, Alex gestured for the assassin to stay back. He made a minor effort of will and transformed into the last soldier he’d consumed, grimacing as he shrank several inches in height and gained an annoying amount of hair. He brushed it out of his eyes and jogged toward the entrance, where two other soldiers stood guard.

Gentek’s headquarters weren’t enormous, but it was in the middle of a courtyard that caused the road to split around it, which made it look more significant and important than it probably deserved. It also meant, though, that the guards in front of the glass doors had all the time in the world to sum Alex up as he trotted toward them.

“State your business, soldier,” the one on the right said.

“On orders from Cap’n Cross to do a headcount before he arrives,” Alex said. “He should be right behind me, don’t wanna keep him waitin’.”

The two soldiers exchanged a look, then lifted their weapons to point at Alex. “Captain Cross has been here for twenty minutes,” the one on the left said. “Wanna try again?”

Alex looked at the two of them, rolled his eyes and sighed, “Not really.” Then he broke one of their noses with the heel of his palm and grabbed the other’s head, slamming it into his knee before the first had fallen. He consumed them both in short order and shivered as silvery visions flickered through his mind.

 _On orders to keep our mouths shut and forget anything we hear_ , the voices of the soldiers he’d just killed said. _The Captain’s putting an end to all of this, he knows what he’s doing, he’s a good man. He’ll end this shit storm._

The voices faded, leaving Alex crouched on the ground feeling for all the world like a child who’d been sent to the principal’s office for breaking rules. He shuddered as he stood and gazed up at the too-bright windows of the building.

“She’s in there,” he whispered. “And Cross is going to kill her….”

 


	14. Mother May I

When Alex signaled him to stay back, Altaïr slid into the shadows of a stunted building. Well, it was stunted by the standards of the other buildings around it, but compared to the houses and mosques and fortifications in Masyaf, it was a towering spire whose architects deserved much praise.

From the relative cover of the shadows, Altaïr watched Alex jog across the open ground. In the time since Altaïr had woken in Manhattan, he’d been trying to decide whether Alex was unbelievably stupid or incomprehensibly brave. He’d been leaning toward the latter, but the stunt Alex pulled when he walked up to the guards at the entrance shoved his decision violently toward stupid.

Trying to ignore the impulse to run out and help his fool of a comrade, Altaïr leaned against the cool wall of the building. The night wasn’t stiflingly hot, nor was it cool enough for him to feel truly comfortable. It reminded him of summer nights at home, spent laying spread-eagle, as naked as was decent, on stone roofs that still held onto the sun’s kiss. He longed to be there now, to feel the oppressive heat of the day ebb away, the curling fingers of a cool breeze tickling his skin.

A shout shook Altaïr from his reverie, and he straightened up, looking across the street to see Alex kneeling down beside the two crumpled forms of the guards.

“Damn you,” he seethed, balling his hands into fists. He gave the area a brief scan and then ran to the Gentek building. He smacked the back of Alex’s head viciously, snarling, “And why did these men deserve to die!”

“Jesus, man, cool your jets,” Alex hissed, rubbing the back of his head and giving the assassin a reproachful look.

“I will cool nothing!” Altaïr snapped. “You’re like a small child! I turn my attention away for five seconds, and you’ve killed yet again!”

“A small child with killer hair,” he scoffed. When Altaïr didn’t laugh, he rolled his eyes and opened the glass doors. “I know why I was called here.”

“Does your reason justify murder?” Altaïr demanded, following him into the building. “I thought not.” He scanned the foyer as they walked through the building. High ceilings, polished floors, pillars that didn’t seem necessary to support the building, and large potted palm trees like those that dotted the harbors and inlands of his home. What bothered him was the lack of security; was this not the headquarters of the most influential party on the island?

“Where is everyone?” Alex asked, looking around. “Not even a secretary?”

“Consult your feeling,” Altaïr sneered. “It’s brought us this far.”

“Ya know, sass is better in moderation,” Alex said blandly. “You’ve used up your quota for the night.”

If he’d been a lesser man, Altaïr might have said something in reply. Instead, he followed Alex to the other side of the foyer and stopped a few feet short of the elevator doors. Without even looking at each other, they said in unison, “Stairs.”

The stairs shouldn’t have posed a problem, they weren’t even particularly steep. But when Alex placed his foot on the first step, he grunted and doubled over in pain, gripping his head with both hands. He sank to his knees and bared his teeth in a grimace of pain.

“What’s happening?” Altaïr demanded. He closed the stairwell door behind them and knelt down, scanning the walls and ceiling. “What’s hurting you?”

“We’re definitely in the right place,” Alex growled. “Help me up, we need to get to the top floor.”

“What’s on the top floor?”

“How the hell should I know? Help me up so we can go find out!”

Knowing he was going to regret it, Altaïr grabbed Alex roughly around the middle and hauled him to his feet, slinging one of the other man’s arms over his shoulders. He supported most of his weight as they stumbled and cursed their way up the stairs, though their struggles were mostly given to the awkwardness of the position rather than the physical demand.

“How many stories does this building have?” the assassin panted after what felt like the twentieth flight of stairs.

Alex raised his head and squinted at a plaque on the wall beside them. “This is the seventh floor,” he sighed. “I don’t know how many there are, but we need to hurry.”

Heeding the warning, they climbed faster. This, of course, equaled more trips and several stubbed toes, but Altaïr found that gripping the banister along the left wall and hauling himself up at the height of each step was easier than just powering through. He counted as they rounded flights this time, feeling relieved when they reached the last landing and were confronted with two doors. One led outside, another led into another room. There was a thin, rectangular window in the metal door, but the room beyond was completely devoid of light. They could see nothing through the glass.

“Open it,” Alex wheezed as Altaïr leaned him against the wall.

“What?” Altaïr demanded indignantly. “Why do I have to open it? This was your idea—”

“Just do what you’re told for once and fucking open the door!” he shouted.

Being yelled at wasn’t something the assassin was used to, and he was taken aback by the other’s tone. He turned to look at Alex, persuading himself that it was not wise to assault this man in closed quarters. The last two times he’d attacked, he’d been incredibly lucky to have caught him off guard. By the looks of him, though, if Altaïr did hit him, he doubted he would be met with any kind of resistance. Alex’s skin was covered in a thin sheen of sweat, and his hair was plastered to his brow. The whites of his eyes were a dingy gray color, tinged with the same feverish red that stained his cheeks. He was trembling, though Altaïr doubted he noticed past the involuntary twitching that made him all but cling to the wall to stay upright.

“You don’t look well,” Altaïr said cautiously. “Are you sure we should go in there?”

Alex shook his head, but was steadfast in his decision. “I have to,” he said in a voice that shook with apprehension. A quavering smile passed over his lips, vanishing as he swallowed hard. “Who else is gonna do it?”

Still unsure this was wise, Altaïr turned and opened the door, stepping aside to allow Alex full access to the room. The second he did, the lights above them flickered out, quickly followed by the _pop_ of glass shattering. The sound was echoed down the stairwell, leaving the two in utter darkness.

“I don’t like this,” Altaïr said uneasily, wishing he had a weapon.

“Stay here then,” Alex said. And before he could lose his nerve, he stood up from the wall and limped into the room, brushing past Altaïr and leaving the scent of fear and sweat in his presence.

 

 

It took every ounce of strength left in Alex’s body for him to walk into that room. Not because he was exhausted from the climb, but because the very fibers of his being were screaming at him to turn around and run. He hesitated before taking each step, and he had to grip fistfuls of his sweatshirt to keep his twitching hands from grabbing onto the door frame. He seemed to be losing control of his body and was clinging on with his fingernails, only managing to grab a handhold when a dim light came into view.

From the poorly filtered light, Alex could see a small area of the room. It was metal, the walls and floors featureless except for a few broken lights in the corners and along the edges of the floor. Was this where She lived? Was this where She was going to be killed?

Something stirred at the far edge of the circle of light, drawing Alex’s attention away from his thoughts. He forced himself to take a few more steps forward and grimaced at what he found. There was a large glass cage standing in the middle of the room, away from the walls. A few steps led up to a door that had been blasted from its hinges, but he could see little past the frame.

“Elizabeth Greene?” he croaked, twitching even harder as the name passed his lips. He shivered violently and stepped up to the door, looking cautiously around the room. It didn’t look dirty, but the smell was like a festering wound whose bandages had gone rancid. He gagged as a warm wave of the stench washed over him, and he leaned against the doorframe as he wretched.

“The time for waiting,” a low, almost sensuous voice whispered, “is over.”

The door behind him slammed shut with a loud _bang,_ and he looked up just in time to see a woman a few inches shorter than himself raise her arm and backhand him so hard he flew across the room into the opposite wall. The back of his head cracked against the metal and he fell, dazed and confused.

“I don’t understand,” he panted. He looked up at the woman, but her face swam in and out of focus, not allowing him to get a decent look at her. She was obviously the source of the smell, though, because as She stepped nearer to him, his eyes streamed tears and he turned his face away.

She stepped close to him and crouched down, putting her face close to his. Her voice whispered through his mind as well as into his ears as She breathed, “Watch.”

Her hand was warm against his brow, and his body surged with energy and pain, straining his muscles as vivid scenes tinged with exaggerated colors and horrific scenes played behind his eyelids. He saw a young woman with bright orange hair and a frightened expression being subdued by several men in surgical suits, bodies strewn across the ground of a city on fire, visions that made him want to cry with anger and grief. These emotions were not his own, but they vanished as quickly as they had appeared, leaving him feeling empty and cold.

Alex fell onto his side with a cry of pain and heard an enormous _crash_ that made his ears ache almost as much as his head. He felt hands grab his face, and the woman lifted his head, touching her lips to his ear as She whispered, “I am your mother.” And in a voice that echoed Hers, he felt the words in his chest, in his very soul, _You are_ mine.

“Alex!” Altaïr cried, though his voice was muffled. “Alex, let me in!”

She released his head, letting it smack unceremoniously onto the floor. He groaned as She stood, leaving him there while Her voice whispered nonsense in his ears, disorienting him.

“Help me,” he groaned, turning his face toward the wall. A large swath of it was missing, just gone. The edges crumbled even as She stepped silently into open air, falling without so much as a whisper. He heard Altaïr pounding on the door, slamming his shoulder against it with all his might, but it wouldn’t budge. The second She dropped out of sight, the door swung open, causing the assassin to stagger into the room and fall, rolling to his feet in one smooth motion.

“What happened!” Altaïr demanded, running to Alex’s side.

“Don’t know…need…to get out of here,” he panted. She was getting away, walking away from the building as calmly as if she was taking a stroll through Central Park. If she went too far, she’d wander into an infected zone. She’d get herself hurt, even killed! The thought forced energy into Alex’s limbs and he sat up, surging to his feet. “I have to stop her!”

“Stop who?” Altaïr asked, looking toward the hole that had replaced a twelve-foot section of the wall. “Did she do that?”

“She did,” Alex said. He staggered to the wall and peered over the edge. “Come on, we can jump this.”

Altaïr joined him and looked out at the city, which was just starting to wake up as the first rays of dawn touched the sky. “I don’t think we can,” he said apprehensively.

A quiet rumble from in the room drew their attention, and in the predawn light, they could see several clusters of three- and four-foot tall spheres. They glowed dimly red as their shapes distorted and stretched. Something that looked disturbingly like a three-fingered hand pressed against the membrane. They were some kind of egg sack, and whatever hideous monster it held was about to hatch.

“I think we should get out of here,” Alex said. The claws pierced the membrane, and a horrible, lipless mouth filled with inch-long fangs that parted in gushes of stringy saliva pushed through. “Like, now!”

“Agreed,” Altaïr said as his eyes widened in revulsion and fear. “What in the name of God is that?”

“Nothing God ever passed through inspection,” Alex snapped. “Grab onto me, and for fuck’s sake, don’t let go. If you break a leg, I’m leaving you behind.”

“If I break my leg, I’ll throw myself on them to save myself the shame,” Altaïr said as he grabbed Alex around the shoulders. He pulled his legs up to rest his knees against Alex’s lower back so he could brace for the impact.

Ignoring that particular discomfort, Alex leaned forward and stepped off the side of the building. For five blissful seconds, they fell through empty air with no sound but the whistling of the air in their ears. It was a welcome reprieve from the blaring horns and constant wailing shrieks of the infected that ended all too soon when Alex slammed into the ground, his legs buckling and pitching Altaïr forward. He heard the assassin grunt on impact, but he rolled with the landing and came up into a crouching position, sliding to a halt on the balls of his feet.

“Can we both agree never to do that again?” Altaïr asked as he came to his feet.

“As long as we get out of here,” Alex agreed, wincing as his broken legs healed themselves. He rolled his shoulders and looked around, feeling disheartened when he didn’t see Her. He couldn’t even feel which direction she’d gone, but he could tell she was far away, probably on the other side of the island by now. How She managed to travel so far so fast was beyond him, but the thought of questioning Her made him queasy.

“Which way should we—” Altaïr had no sooner asked the question than the top floor of the Gentek building exploded in a shower of glass and rubble the size of a person’s head.

“Get down!” Alex shouted, grabbing the assassin and throwing him to the ground. He crouched over the other man, shielding him from the debris with his body. The bruises and cuts he received healed immediately, and he felt his hunger grow with every blow. He’d have to feed soon, away from the prying eyes of Mr. Saintly-Do-No-Evil.

Shouts sounded on either side of the intersection, followed by the low rumbling of tank treads on asphalt. The military was en-route, and they had about thirty seconds before they were discovered. The last thing they needed was a strike team on their asses.

“Go!” Alex hissed, shoving at Altaïr as he stood up. He got the assassin to his feet and pointed him in the direction of the nearest infected zone. “Run and don’t stop until you collapse, you understand me?”

“Where are you going?” Altaïr demanded, looking over his shoulder even as he ran.

“I’ll catch up! Just go!”

Alex waited until Altaïr had rounded a corner, then he found a dark, quiet corner and pulled the burner phone out of his pocket. The case had been cracked, but when he pressed a button, the little screen displayed a message stating he had three missed calls. He rolled his eyes and called the number, holding the phone to his ear.

When Cross picked up, he didn’t scream. He didn’t shout, he didn’t do anything Alex expected a man of his stature to do, and that made the uneasy, icy rock in his gut ever more concerning.

“What did you just do?” the Captain asked.

Alex’s mouth was suddenly very dry as he recalled Her, how She’d smelled, the sound of Her voice, the brief glimpse he’d seen of Her in the memories. “I uh…I don’t really know what to tell you.”

He could practically feel Cross trembling with rage on the other end of the line. “Do you know who that woman was?”

“I’m guessing she wasn’t your great aunt, Bessy?” he said, trying for charm and only succeeding in sounding like a teenager who’d just wrecked his dad’s Ferrari.

“That… _woman_ ,” Cross said, unable to not spit the name with as much venom as he could muster, “was the only thing on this island more dangerous than you.” He paused long enough that Alex checked to make sure the call hadn’t been dropped, and when the Captain spoke again, he sounded weary, as if he was tired of it all. “Did you even stop to wonder why no one was in the building?”

“Well, yeah but—”

“That should have been your first clue that you were somewhere you really shouldn’t have been.”

A pregnant silence stretched between them, and Alex finally asked, “Well, are you gonna tell me what you were doing that required the building to be empty?”

“No, I’m not,” Cross sighed. “Use your brain for once, I’m sure you’ll be able to piece it together eventually. For now, I’ve got to go fix another of your messes.”

“How could this one _possibly_ be all my fault?” Alex demanded. “Sure, most of it, but I mean come on—”

“Go crawl under a rock for a while, Mercer. Stay out of trouble so I can get some shut eye, would you? I can’t keep this up for much longer.”

That almost sounded like Captain Cross asking for a favor, and it stunned Alex into silence. He’d just had a civilized conversation with the man, and it hadn’t ended with him being maimed, butchered or broken in any way, shape, or form. How…concerning.

“Yeah, sure,” he said. “I can do that.” But the line was already dead. Cross hadn’t heard him.

Alex made his way across town, heading in the direction he’d sent Altaïr off to. He was too tired to even bother watching for military personnel, and when he passed an alley and felt someone reach out and grab the front of his jacket, he didn’t fight. He was slammed into the side of the alley wall and looked up at the soot-smudged face of Altaïr. The man’s olive skin was pale with dust from the explosion, and there were specks of debris in his short hair.

“What was that about?” he demanded. “What was that fire? Why did the building blast apart? Why did you tell me to run ahead while you stayed behind?” When Alex said nothing, the assassin released his jacket and took a step back. “God, you are so damned stubborn!”

That almost made him smile, but he just wasn’t in the mood. He’d been battered and bruised, tossed around physically and mentally, and had probably had his psyche scarred beyond repair. Zeus hadn’t weighed in on anything in a while, and that in and of itself was worrying. When the loud mouth shuts up, shit has obviously hit the fan.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” Altaïr asked, the tension in his shoulders shifting so that he stood in what must have been a defensive position. It just looked ridiculous to Alex, but he supposed it served some kind of purpose.

“Could you stop talking?” Alex mumbled. “For just like, five minutes. That’s it. Just five minutes.”

Altaïr swelled with indignation, but he didn’t say anything in response. Either he was taking Alex’s request under advisement, or he was so affronted that he couldn’t find the words to express himself. Alex took this opportunity to strike.

Careful not to move so quickly as to invite any violence, Alex reached out and touched Altaïr’s cheek, gently at first as he ran the tips of his fingers over the stubble on the other man’s skin. It was a nice feeling, rough and unkempt, a pleasant contrast to a woman’s skin. He moved his hand to brush the debris from the assassin’s hair and then trailed his fingers down the side of his face, tracing his thumb over his lips.

The tension in Altaïr’s shoulders lessened, but he pulled away slightly, a suspicious look on his face. _What are you doing?_ his narrowed eyes demanded. _Do not kiss me,_ his hands said as they balled into loose fists. Yet he didn’t stop Alex’s hand as it slowly slid down his neck to his chest, farther still to his abdomen where it snaked around behind his back and pulled them sharply together, pressing their bodies close. Their mouths were inches apart, their eyes so close they could see every detail of each other’s irises, and yet neither of them said a word.

Just when it seemed they would stand there forever in their strange, challenging dance, Altaïr’s resolve relaxed ever so slightly, and he pressed their lips together. The kiss started out chaste, a tasting of the other, testing the waters before they even thought of jumping in. Their hands remained where they were, neither willing to risk driving the other over the edge of what they were comfortable with. A kiss was nothing, a gesture between friends, a greeting or farewell…but what their kiss became was nothing short of lewd.

The hungers that drove them, the desire for connection and the desire to return home respectively, consumed them in that moment, and their self control dissolved. They tore at each other with frantic hands, trying to touch as much of each other as they could without breaking the kiss. Alex was the first to find his mark, and he gripped Altaïr, making the assassin gasp softly and fight to regain control of their embrace. He stroked quickly, feeling the hardness of the other’s body, the firmness of the muscles under his skin and the heat of his labored breath mounting into Altaïr’s surprised cry of release. He drew a great breath even as he threw his head back and threaded his fingers through Alex’s hair, gripping as if his fingers were vices.

Alex hadn’t even had time to wipe his hand clean before Altaïr all but pounced on him, pushing him up against the alley wall again as he tore his belt away and yanked his pants down to his ankles. “Hey wait—” he tried to say, but his folded up belt was put between his teeth as Altaïr turned him to face the alley wall. He braced his hands against the unpleasantly moist bricks and looked back at the assassin. There was a hunger in his eyes that had nothing to do with food, and it finally occurred to Alex that Altaïr was quite a bit taller than him, more broad in the chest and with longer legs. His muscles were leaner, but gained through hard labor that had honed them into works of beauty. And, he noticed with no small amount of jealousy, he was a few inches longer and much wider than him below the belt.

They wasted no time, Alex bowing his head as he smashed his fist against the wall, biting into the leather of his belt as he burned. He heard Altaïr moan softly, and the sound stirred something primal in him. His body, unaccustomed though it was to such an intrusion, seemed to know what it wanted, and he pushed up off the wall to meet the assassin’s thrusts. They had their pleasure, struggling for dominance even as Altaïr shoved him against the brick wall and used him until tears streamed from the corners of his eyes.

The pain almost became too much near the end, but Altaïr reached around to grip Alex, and the touch distracted him, reminded him why he was doing this. He wanted the contact, the connection to another person, and this was unlike anything he ever remembered having. The most intimacy he was used to having was the instant before his victims died, before they stopped being people and became food. This, though, was something beyond anything he’d hoped for.

Without the belt, he might have screamed when he reached his edge and climaxed, but Altaïr grabbed him by the hair and pulled his head back, making him arch up off the wall again as he spasmed and twitched, spilling into the other man’s hand. He felt his teeth meet in the belt as he panted, and he shuddered when Altaïr pulled away, leaving him feeling empty and sore. The ache vanished after a few seconds, but his legs strained to keep him upright. He leaned heavily against the alley wall even as Altaïr struggled to pull his pants up before he sat down hard on the ground. The assassin ran his fingers through his short hair and shook his head, muttering to himself, a look of disbelief on his face.

“Don’t worry babe,” Alex panted, unable to resist, “they all react like that.”


	15. Making Enemies for Dummies

It took less than two minutes for them to recognize the severity of what they’d just done. Alex had just pulled his pants up and was threading his belt through the loops on his jeans when Altaïr came to a decision.

“What?” Alex asked, pulling his shirts and jackets back into place.

“No,” Altaïr said sternly. He shook his head and pointed a finger menacingly at the other man. “No. I know you well enough by now to know that you’re going to want to talk about this, and I am warning you now that I am not having any of it.”

“What? You’re the one going around moping about what’s right and wrong,” Alex said indignantly. “If either of us is going to get all preachy about this, it’s going to be you.”

When no argument to the contrary came to mind, Altaïr simply shook his head again and swore under his breath as he came to his feet. “I don’t want to think about it,” he said. “If I think about it, I’m going to hit something—likely you.”

“Scared you might be gay?” Alex sneered. “It’s the twenty-first century, princess, no one gives a shit.”

He assumed the other’s words were meant to be amusing, but they really only served to worsen his mood. “I don’t have the patience to handle this right now,” he sighed, rubbing his hands over his face. “We need to be doing something, don’t we?”

“Yeah, we need to find a place to sleep. I’m dead on my feet,” Alex muttered. He said something else under his breath, but it was too quiet for Altaïr to hear.

“What did you say?”

“Nothing,” Alex snapped a little more harshly than was strictly necessary.

“It’s obviously something,” Altaïr said. “If you thought it was so important to speak in the first place, say it louder so I can hear you. Or are you afraid it might offend me?”

Alex snorted, but turned to face the assassin. “Alright,” he said, and there was something in his voice that Altaïr couldn’t identify. It almost sounded indignant, but there was hostility in the other’s posture that he didn’t understand. “Let me summarize today, shall I? First, I get abducted and tortured by Blackwatch and end up having to save both of our asses because of your botched rescue attempt—during which you got shot _twice_. Second, I take a dunk in the river, and you end up drowning, which, by the way, seems like a really stupid fucking way to die considering you’re a master assassin. At this point, I’ve gone on autopilot because of a fucking _voice in my head_ , and I infect you with this impossibly annoying virus—”

Altaïr opened his mouth to argue that the last wasn’t his fault, but Alex held up a finger, and the look in his eye was enough to silence the assassin’s protest.

“Third! I end up having to save your ass yet again after you fall down an elevator shaft—which I still haven’t figured out how you managed to fuck that one up so badly, but I’ll chock it up to you having a particularly good skill set that involves you getting hurt in the most imaginative ways possible.” He took a breath, but didn’t seem to be losing his momentum. “Fourth, I find a way to heal you that shouldn’t have technically been possible, but I manage to pull it off. And what do I get in return? Broken bones and sass. You attacked me _twice_ , you ungrateful prick, and when we finally get a minute away from the explosions and mayhem, you fuck me like an animal in a dirty alley and then have the balls to demand that we not talk about it.”

By now, Altaïr had given up on getting a word in edgewise, but he was fairly entertained by the red color that had flushed over Alex’s cheeks and the tips of his ears in his anger.

“So you’ll have to forgive me if I’m not exactly buddy-buddy with you right now,” he finished.

Altaïr crossed his arms over his chest and looked down at the ground, absently kicking a stone aside. “Don’t forget,” he said against his better judgment, “that you led us into a building that ended up in flames. After a woman half your size bounced your head off the walls a few times.”

Alex stared at him like he’d grown a second head, then smiled in an unpleasant way. “But of course!” he said, throwing his hands into the air. “We can’t forget that part, now can we? I’ll just add it to the roster.”

 Now Alex’s attitude was starting to get on his nerves. Sure he’d thrown the other’s plans for a loop, but he hadn’t caused him so much grief to warrant this…had he?

“If I hadn’t come to your aid in the holding facility, you would have been killed there,” he pressed. “They were torturing you, Alex. Did you expect me to just leave you there?”

“As opposed to what? Getting yourself shot and creating a worse situation for me to have to work around? Yes, I think I would have preferred being left there!”

Altaïr bristled, unable to quell his indignation. How ungrateful could one man be? He’d saved his life, for God’s sake! And even now, despite the incident with the two soldiers on the rooftop, Altaïr was indebted to Alex for saving him from the elevator shaft. He couldn’t tell him off and just leave.

“You are an incredibly frustrating man,” Altaïr spat.

“Welcome to the fucking club, man. I’ve never met someone as prone to injury and stupid decisions as you,” Alex retorted. “So do me a favor and get the fuck away from me before you spontaneously combust.”

Although he wasn’t sure what Alex meant by that, he recognized an insult when he heard one. “If I leave by your order and harm comes to you, I will be held responsible. I will never live down the shame of allowing someone I’m indebted to—”

“Oh my fucking god, would you just shut up!” Alex shouted. He balled his hands into fists, and his arms shook as if he was forcing himself not to strike out. “You aren’t in the middle ages in bumfuck nowhere, you’re in the United States of America, where the closest we come to chivalry or honor is holding a door open and maybe not going back on a promise if we feel like being a halfway decent person.” He advanced a step, and Altaïr actually danced back a few paces, out of the other’s reach. He didn’t think Alex would actually try to hit him, but there was no sense in tempting the man. “Now get the fuck out of my sight.”

_He’s giving you a way out_ , Altaïr thought. _If you try to stay with him, he will attack you. It’s in your best interest to walk away. He is ordering you away, there’s nothing you can do. Your honor will not be questioned._ He resisted the urge to roll his eyes at that thought. If no one in this century truly considered their word worth anything, why should he worry about his honor?

_You weren’t raised that way,_ the voice in the back of his head piped in. _But please, just walk away. This is getting painful to watch._

Ignoring the voice, Altaïr drew himself up and looked away from Alex. “Fine,” he said. “I will leave.”

“Good!” Alex snarled. “Hurry up and do it, then.”

Altaïr shot him a nasty look, but said nothing more. Instead, he turned and walked away.

 

It didn’t take long for Alex to realize what a bad idea it was to send Altaïr out into the city without him. He wondered how long it would take the assassin to get himself into trouble and need to be rescued. Then he remembered why he’d sent the moron away in the first place. He was sick of playing mother hen to a grown man who was, supposedly, a master in his own rights. He was starting to think Altaïr had lied about that. Maybe he was really the village idiot.

Alex had just made up his mind to visit an empty water tower he often slept in when Blackwatch was being particularly annoying and he couldn’t shake them long enough to get to his apartment. He hadn’t taken three steps, though, before the ground shuddered and rumbled under his feet, knocking him into the alley wall. He heard the explosion seconds before the ground jumped again, and he tried to pick himself up when the world exploded in front of his eyes. The opposite wall of the alley rushed at him in sharp fragments, raining shards of slimy brick over him. He coughed and blinked dust out of his eyes, swearing as more debris stung sharply against his side.

His ears rang deafeningly for a fraction of a second, crackling into static and then rising in a crescendo of screaming and the low rumble of far away explosions. His body repaired the damage to his ears, and then the cuts on his face. He came to his hands and knees, grimaced in pain, and looked down his front. A shard of brick had lodged into his gut when the wall exploded, and his body was trying to push it out. He gave it a tug and it fell away with a wet squelching sound and a trickle of black blood.

“Damn,” he panted, “that was bracing.”

"Rebecca, this way!" a voice shouted over the scattered screams of fleeing citizens. How many had been killed in this attack? It was early enough that many people would still be asleep. Not that he particularly cared, but Blackwatch's disregard for innocent human lives in the pursuit of trying to kill him was astounding. They should have at least cleared the civilians out before trying to blow him up.

Come to think of it, that's exactly what Blackwatch would have done. Especially if Cross had anything to say about it. And how the hell did they know he was even there? He’d run far enough from where he’d made the call to Cross that they couldn’t have found him by tracing the call. Besides, burner phones couldn’t be tracked…could they?

_Fuck_ , he thought viciously. Cross could have been playing him this entire fucking time, and he wouldn’t have known about it. Then again, if this had been Cross’s plan from the get-go, it was a pretty badly executed plan. Blackwatch had never used incendiaries; they preferred punching holes in what they wanted dead rather than blowing it to bits. And Alex doubted even Cross could pull together a strike team in the time it took him to end the call and get to that alley. Something about this stank, and he was going to find out what. As soon as he got away from the explody part of town.

“Rebecca, now! We were supposed to meet Desmond at the safe house ten minutes ago! If we aren’t there in—”

The man to whom the English-accented voice belonged staggered out of the wreckage of the alley wall carrying a pouch in one hand. He had red hair that was quickly masked in a film of brick dust and he wore a white lab coat over a beige sweater and dark brown slacks. His glasses were filthy and sat askew on his face, but he pushed them up the bridge of his nose regardless of whether he could see out of them.

“What’s up?” Alex said, giving a small wave.

“Um…nothing,” the redhead replied warily. He shifted his stance so that the pouch in his right hand was hidden behind his thigh. “Rebecca!” he shouted back the way he’d come.

“Keep your voice down, Shaun! I’m coming. If you hadn’t used so much powder, we wouldn’t have all this crud in the way.” A woman clambered through the rubble, emerging with dust in her black hair and a cut on her cheek that oozed blood. She wore the same kind of white lab coat over combat boots, knee-length shorts and a T-shirt advertising some band Alex had never heard of. She shot a glare at the man beside her and muttered, “Asshole,” before noticing Alex. Her demeanor changed immediately, and she took half a step back. “Is he one of them?”

“I doubt it,” the man named Shaun said. “Abstergo wouldn’t dress like that.”

“Hey!” Alex protested. “There’s nothing wrong with my outfit, thank you very much.” He ran his fingers petulantly through his hair and turned his nose up at them. “I’m beautiful.”

“We need to get moving,” the woman, who Alex assumed was Rebecca, said. “We’ve still got a while to go before we’re safe.”

“Right. Well it’s been nice chatting with you,” Shaun said as he pushed past Alex, “but we’re late for a dinner party. Cheers.”

“Whoa, what’s this?” Alex asked, grabbing the other man’s arm as he passed.

Shaun yanked his arm out of Alex’s grip a second too late. The sack he’d been holding tore and a dull, golden orb fell out onto the ground, hitting the pavement with a hollow and heavy _thunk_.

“Well I’ll be damned,” Alex laughed. “You two just made my life a helluva lot easier.” He snatched up the Apple before Shaun or Rebecca could get any funny ideas and tucked it away in his jacket pocket. “I have to wonder, though, how’d you find it? I hid it pretty well in my apartment.”

A look of confusion clouded the frustration and anger on the others’ faces, and Rebecca stepped forward, her posture hinting at intimidation. It would have worked better if she came up past his shoulders and weighed more than a sack of potatoes.

“Look mate, we don’t want any trouble,” Shaun said lowly, putting a hand on Rebecca’s shoulder, “but you’ve no idea what that is. If we don’t bring it—”

“It’s the Apple of Eden, unimaginably powerful and dangerous artifact, catastrophically deadly in the wrong hands, blah blah blah,” Alex sighed. “I get it. Look, I just need to borrow it for an hour or two. I need it to get rid of a pest problem. Then you two can have it back and go about your merry way saving the world and whatnot.”

They stared at him, slack-jawed, as if they didn’t know what to say. Then Rebecca attacked.

Alex saw the kick coming a mile away, but he didn’t bother moving. The heel of the woman’s combat boot connected with his jaw, breaking it with an audible _crack_ and whipping his head around fast enough that it might have broken his neck if he hadn’t prepared for it. The boot had offered a little more heft to the kick than he’d anticipated, but he did nothing more than squint his eyes and roll with the pain. He grabbed his chin, jerked his jaw back into place and straightened up.

“That wasn’t very nice,” he said slowly as the break healed.

Shaun drew a knife as long as his forearm from a sheath under his lab coat and brandished it as if he knew what he was doing. Experienced or not, it didn’t matter to Alex. He stepped forward, grabbed the man’s hand around the handle and rammed the blade into his belly up to the hilt. The faster they realized what he was and what he could do, the faster they would stop dicking around and let him get back to what he was doing.

“Christ!” Shaun shouted, staggering back as Alex doubled over and coughed blood onto his sweater.

“He’s insane,” Rebecca breathed. She backed away, watching Alex warily and trying to put herself in a better position to grab the Apple from his jacket pocket.

“Hold on, hold on,” Alex croaked. He held up a hand and straightened up, spitting to the side to clear his mouth. “Sorry about your sweater, man, wasn’t expecting the blood.” He cleared his throat and looked down at his stomach, as if he’d forgotten the knife was there. “Oh, right.” He grabbed the handle and pulled it out sharply, dropping it as soon as it cleared his flesh.

“What are you?” Shaun asked. He looked like he was about to vomit or bolt, possibly both at the same time.

“I’m awesome,” Alex said, grinning. He waited for the wound in his abdomen to heal before he rubbed his hands together and sighed, “Down to business. I’m guessing you two got this from somewhere other than my apartment. Where’d you get it?”

The two exchanged a nervous look and remained silent.

“If I really wanted to, I could beat the information out of you,” Alex said pointedly, “but I’d rather not waste more time. I’m gonna find out where you got it one way or another, so you might as well save us all the pain and just tell me. Last time I’m gonna ask nicely.”

They looked at each other again—didn’t people ever talk anymore? Communicating through looks was getting annoying—and then Shaun said, “We took it from the Abstergo building. They were trying to stop us, hence the explosions and screaming.”

_Abstergo_. The name sounded familiar, and it made his head ache as flashes of memories passed behind his eyelids. He’d seen the name at the bottom of classified documents, mentioned here and there in reports. A sister company of Gentek.

“Alright,” he said, “I don’t suppose either of you saw a tall guy with a scar on his lip and a bad attitude when you were blasting through walls?”

“Sounds like someone we know,” Shaun snorted. Then he bristled, and he looked at Rebecca, who glared at him as if to tell him to keep his mouth shut.

“Goes by the name Altaïr Ibn Something or Other.” He expected confusion, but not hostility, so the throwing knife that was suddenly held just below his ear was something of a surprise. Rebecca was inches away from him, her eyes bright with anger and mistrust, her mouth set in a grimace. “Go on, girlie,” Alex said calmly, his voice hardly above a whisper. “Cut my throat. Let’s see how far you can run before I catch you, hmm? That sounds like fun to me.”

“Everyone calm down!” Shaun said loudly.

“If he knows that name, he could know other things that he shouldn’t,” Rebecca said in a strained voice. “We can’t just let him go if—”

“Rebecca, we need to get the Apple off this island, or everyone’s going to die.”

“Jesus Christ, what is it with you people and the drama?” Alex sighed. He snatched the knife out of Rebecca’s hand and pushed her back toward Shaun. “I’ll get the Apple back to you before the day, you have my word on that. But I need to send this asshole back where he belongs before he gets himself—or more importantly, _me_ —killed. Capishe?”

The ground shuddered beneath them as another explosion rocked the earth fifty paces away, and Alex used the distraction to leap up onto the roof of the building to their right. “’Preciate your help, guys! See you later!”

“Wait! Shit!” he heard Shaun shout, but he didn’t stick around to give them a chance to catch up.

Leaping across rooftops was a simple enough task, but his body was starting to protest against the brutal paces he’d been running through. Being battered and bruised had come to be a normal part of his daily life, but he usually had time to feed between beatings. He’d had little to no time to do anything other than run, hide, or get pissed off by Altaïr throughout the evening. He needed to feed soon, or his body was going to seize up and make him, and he’d have no choice in what was on the menu.

After picking up a bystander or six, Alex fed until he was satisfied, which was no easy feat since he always seemed to be hungry. Without the assassin’s prying eyes watching his every movement, he was able to do what he needed without feeling judged for everything he did. Yet with every person he nabbed, he realized, somewhere far in the back of his head, that the person he’d just killed probably had a family, friends, a life of their own they were trying to live despite the infection raging in the city around them. What hurt Alex the most was the realization that he just didn’t give a damn anymore.

When his hunger was sated, Alex scoured the city for hours, searching high and low for his runaway assassin. He couldn’t find hide or hair of the fool, and by noon, he was too exhausted to continue looking. His eyelids drooped even as he staggered into an alleyway, tripping over a discarded bottle and kicking it aside viciously. It skittered down the darkened alley until it bounced against a shoe. A shoe Alex thought he recognized…one that was splattered with blood.

“Shit,” he muttered as he walked toward it. “Not again, I swear this fucker goes out of his way to get hurt.” He stooped to pick up the shoe and immediately threw himself to the side, letting out a cry of alarm.

Shaun emerged from the shadows looking grim and unarmed. “Nighty night, mate,” he said as his eyes tracked to something behind him.

Agony exploded over the back of Alex’s head, and he heard the sharp _crack_ of wood splintering. He fell to his knees and couldn’t help but find this whole situation amusing. Apparently, super-virus or not, blunt force trauma was blunt force trauma.

Alex’s cheek hit the pavement and the world went black.


	16. Boundaries

"This isn't happening, this isn't happening, this _can't_ be happening! How the _fuck_ is this happening? What the _fuck_!"

Altaїr was beginning to wonder if his capture knew any words other than fuck. He'd been listening to the same stream of foul curses and exclamations since he'd woken up. Blindfolded, he had no way to tell how long he'd been there. Gagged, he had no way to ask questions. With two of his senses deadened, he wasn't about to try anything brash, either. He could probably have fought his way out of a situation like this, but he couldn’t be sure that there was only one other person in the room. The man was irate, often delving into fits of what seemed to be hysteria. Altaїr assumed the man had a gun, and he wasn't prepared to risk being shot again to prove he was right. Not even if his new abilities would heal him.

"You shouldn't be here. You shouldn't _be_ here! _You can't be here_!" Altaїr heard a loud crash and something knocked into his chair. For a moment, he tottered on two of the spindly legs then toppled over, throwing all of his weight onto his shoulder and wrenching his bound wrists. He grunted in pain, but otherwise made no sound.

"Fuck fuck fuck fuck _fuck_!" the man muttered. He hurried forward, grabbed Altaїr’s shoulder and his aching wrist and yanked him back up. As soon as he felt the madman's touch, Altaїr focused on the hunger that burned low in his gut, in his chest, in the very core of his being. He tapped into that hunger and felt tongues of mass shoot out from the points of contact, lashing at the man's flesh. He’d seen Alex do this several times, but had never thought to do it himself. It seemed wrong, and even as wicked barbs sank into flesh, sinew and bone, he wanted to take it back. He shouldn’t be using this power, especially not to harm another person. What was wrong with him?

"What the hell!" the man shouted. So he did know other curses. Lovely. He shrieked in wordless panic that devolved into repeated cries of, "Get off of me!"

Angered now by the other’s indignation, Altaїr’s guilt all but vanished. He bit down on his gag and bared his teeth in a snarl. The man screamed again, writhing and yanking at his hands, trying to get away but only managing to tear his own flesh. One of his hands came free, but the other stuck fast, making Altaїr's arm jerk with every frantic tug. From the blood and pieces of skin he devoured, a thought that made him want to vomit, Altaїr figured the imbecile was doing more harm than actually accomplishing anything.

"What the bloody hell is going on?" a voice demanded. The lilt of the words and the softness around the syllables were familiar. He knew that accent. It was one that struck him in the gut and sucked the breath from his lungs. Maria's words were honeyed in the same way, though this voice was rougher, masculine, and the words he spoke were uncultured and careless. When he made the connection, his eyes narrowed and filled with tears. He sucked in a breath around the gag and turned his head to listen better.

"Desmond, what in the hell are you doing? Oh Christ, he's bleeding! Rebecca, help me."

"Get it off!" the man named Desmond shouted. He pulled desperately at his hand and Altaїr was loathe to release him. The surprised _oof_ he heard in the Englishman's tenor voice gave the assassin a moment of pride before someone punched him. The blow was obviously wild because instead of connecting with his jaw, cheekbone, nose, mouth, or really any part of his head where it would have been the least bit effective, the fist clipped the side of his head and ear, pulling the blindfold askew.

Light blinded Altaїr, making him inhale sharply and immediately shut his eyes. He blinked rapidly, forcing his eyes to adjust. Through the angled space the blindfold created, Altaїr saw several towers of crates around him. There was a soaring ceiling, many flashing green and red lights, support beams that criss-crossed from one side of the building to the other, and he could see part of a loft that must have led to a second floor. It was a warehouse of some kind, and it was spacious enough to house many hiding places should he require them.

"Jesus, Mary and Joseph," the Englishman breathed. He was lanky and pale with strangely red hair and sharp blue eyes. Nothing like Maria. "Is that...." The man's eyes widened and his jaw dropped, his mouth forming a little 'o' shape.

"Shaun, that's Altaїr!" the raven-haired woman standing beside him exclaimed. She must have been Rebecca. She seemed strangely excited to see him.

Finally, Altaїr's eyes rested on the man who had been screaming. Desmond. Something about the name sounded agonizingly familiar, like he was overhearing some conversation he'd had in the past but couldn't quite make out the words. He probably would have figured it out if he hadn't been distracted by Desmond’s features. From the man's short, light brown hair to his olive skin, from his nearly-golden eyes to even the pale scar on his lips, he looked exactly like Altaїr.

"Demon," the assassin whispered around his gag. His eyes widened and tears of rage and pure, naked fear filled his eyes. His body consumed the fabric of the gag and the blindfold, drawing a collective gasp from the other three people in the room. "Specter!” he snarled. "Devil! Witch! You've stolen my face, you foul demon! Be gone! You will find no sinner here!"

Without taking her eyes off of him, Rebecca turned her head toward Desmond. "You think he’s okay upstairs?" she whispered, tapping a finger to her temple.

"Release me!" Altaїr roared. He struggled against the sticky, matte gray material that bound his wrists to the arms of the chair and had only just realized he could simply consume the restraints when he saw a crumpled form behind his captors. It looked remarkably like...no, no it _was_ Alex. The scarlet designs on the back of the jacket were unmistakable.

"What have you done to him?" he asked. He met the eyes of the face thief and stood from the chair, disregarding the existence of his restraints entirely. He was several inches taller than the other three, and being able to tower over them only blew on the coals of his temper, flaring them into life. "What did you do!"

Shaun and Rebecca shrank back, avoiding looking at him. Only Desmond, the man who had just moments before been babbling incoherent nonsense, remained where he stood.

" _La shaiq' waqee mutlak bl kollin mumkin_ ," Desmond stated. His voice and eyes were clear, sharp, absolute. He stated the words perfectly, rolling the syllables off his tongue as if he had spoken the language all his life. And then he gave a short, respectful bow.

Altaїr's fury dissipated into confusion and then bewilderment. "Well met, brother," he forced past the lump in his throat. He studied Desmond for a long moment before rolling his shoulders back and allowing himself to relax just enough so that he didn’t shake with rage. "You are of the Brotherhood?"

Desmond nodded once, but did not speak. Altaїr noted a fine tremble in the man's hands and watched dispassionately as the other man’s eyes rolled back in his head and he crumpled to the floor in a heap.

"Desmond!" Rebecca cried. She knelt beside her fallen comrade and then looked back at Shaun. "Help me carry him upstairs."

"What about him?" Shaun asked, gesturing to Altaїr.

"I will be here when you return," Altaїr assured him, though his voice was none too friendly. "I want to understand this devilry."

"Devilry, sorcery, doesn't anyone ever think for just a moment that something might be science's doing?" Shaun muttered as he grabbed Desmond under the arms.

"Not the time," Rebecca huffed as she grabbed the unconscious man around his middle.

"I'm just saying, it'd be nice to get a little appreciation in the modern world. Did you know..."

Altaїr stopped listening to their words, but kept their positions in mind, tracking their steps even as he turned and walked toward Alex. "I suppose it would be too much to hope that their treatment of you had any kind of humbling effect?" he sighed.

"Naw," Alex drawled as he sat up. "Why would I let these jerkoffs teach me anything?" He grimaced and then looked up at Altaїr. "How'd you end up here anyway? Figured you'd be off looking for the Apple or brooding in some dark corner of the city."

Altaїr’s cheeks and the tips of his ears flushed with warmth, and he looked deliberately away. "I'd rather keep that to myself if it's all the same to you," he said. He watched Alex study him and prayed the other man wouldn't press the subject. He would rather not share the tumble he'd taken off a particularly high building. Or the fact he'd wet himself on the way down. He still wasn’t convinced that he could no longer be killed by mere impact.

"Well, while you were out sulking, I found the stupid thing," Alex said primly. "More than I can say for you, apparently."

"You've found it?" Altaїr demanded. He stepped closer to Alex, examining his empty hands and the conspicuous lack of spherical bulges in his jacket pockets. "Well, where is it?"

Alex opened his mouth as if to speak, hesitated, and slouched back, looking deflated.

"You've lost it, haven't you?" Altaїr sighed.

"Have not!" Alex retorted sharply. "I know exactly where it is."

"Then go get it," Altaїr said, setting his hands akimbo and looking down his nose at the shorter man. "I swear, you’re worse than the dimmest novice I’ve ever had the misfortune of knowing.”

"Don't you dare look at me like that," Alex snapped, and the harshness in his words nearly made Altaїr flinch. He obviously wasn’t in the mood to be poked at. "If it wasn't for me, you'd have been dead in that alley. I don't remember you ever thanking me for that, by the way."

"Yes, thank you for introducing me to this new way of life. It is far preferable to my old existence," Altaїr retorted, feeling perfectly justified in his indignation. Alex had been needling him about this since he’d woken up in this nightmarish city, and the fact that Altaїr had been unable to stop himself from being picked up never seemed to come up when Alex chose to remind him of it.

"Get the fucking thing yourself," Alex snapped. "Carrot Top's got it."

"Oi, I've got _red_ hair, thank you." Shaun and Rebecca descended from the loft side-by-side, each carrying a gun no larger than their hands. They held them pointed at the ground, but even with his limited knowledge, he doubted this was a sign of incompetence.

"You could have lime green hair and a sombrero on your ass," Alex said hotly, "and I wouldn't give a damn. Give me the Apple and we'll be out of here."

"Look," Rebecca started, but Shaun cut her off.

"Why do you want it?"

"Like I said before, I need to send tall, dark and dumb back to his own time," Alex said. "It's like I'm not even talking! Nobody listens!"

"Silence," Altaїr ordered. He purposefully avoided looking at Alex, because the irritation he felt pulsing from the other man in near-palpable waves was enough of an indication that he had taken things too far for him to get the message. Perhaps, though, this was good. He had been getting too close to Alex, allowing himself too much freedom where their relationship was concerned. He had forgotten his purpose in this time, and he refused to be drawn into the drama of the other man’s life. If Alex wanted to run around the city fighting the military and whatever hellspawn had settled into this accursed island, he was welcome to, but Altaїr wanted nothing to do with it. He had a goal in mind, and he was close to achieving it.

"That man, the one you call Desmond. He shares my face. How is that possible?"

Rebecca and Shaun exchanged uncertain glances then looked back to Altaїr. "How about you tell us how you came to be here," the Englishman suggested.

He disliked the change in focus, but Altaїr shared his story regardless. He told them of the Apple and his studies, of the evening when he was ripped away from his home and cast into this foreign city. Whether they believed his words or not was their own prerogative, but he would have liked to be able to at least gauge their reactions. They were stony-faced and stoic, and as he ended his story with a solemn, “And now I have woken here, once again surrounded by unfamiliarity and hostility,” they shifted uneasily.

After a moment of tense silence, Shaun spoke. “So, if I’m understanding everything that’s happened so far, there are currently two Pieces of Eden on the island.”

“It would stand to reason,” Altaїr agreed. “You’re certain you know where the one you possess came from?”

“Definitely not an apartment,” Rebecca said, tucking her gun in the back of her pants and crossing her arms under her breasts. She shifted her stance again to keep Alex, who had stalked off toward a stack of crates, in her line of sight. “We lifted it off of a faction of Abstergo that had set up shop downtown. It was way harder to get to than we thought it’d be.”

Altaїr nodded slowly, gathering together the trails of thought he was pursuing. "If this is true…” His voice trailed off and he shook his head, disregarding the theory. He didn’t have enough information to start forming opinions or ideas, he would have to wait until he knew more. “The Apple you have in your possession,” he said. “Does it glow when you look upon it?"

Rebecca and Shaun exchanged a look, then they both shook their heads.

"Have either of you touched it?" Altaїr pressed. “I mean physically touched the metal with your skin.”

"I had to get it out of a glass case that was wired with three different alarm systems," Rebecca stated. "It just looked like any old metal ball." She frowned, then her expression tightened into panic. "Are you suggesting the one we have is a fake?"

Altaїr shrugged, glad he could honestly say that he had no idea. "The Apple I arrived with in this time has stopped behaving as it normally would. I do not understand time travel well enough to provide any theories as to why this might have happened, but I assume it has something to do with the existence of its twin.”

“Unfortunately, humans haven’t made any major leaps in understanding time travel within the last nine-hundred odd years, so we’re out of luck there, mate,” Shaun said. He crossed his arms, glanced at Alex, and then looked toward the loft. “I do wonder, though, whether...well no, that would be absurd.”

“Please,” Altaїr said, gesturing for the other man to continue, “share what you know. Your words cannot be any stranger than what has happened to me thus far.”

Shaun smirked, as if agreeing with his statement, and then pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “The Apple that you brought from your time,” he said, “when did it start behaving erratically?”

“Moments before it transported me here,” Altaїr replied. “I had perhaps thirty seconds to react before I was blinded and incapacitated. When I opened my eyes, I was here and the Apple had stopped working.”

“It just stopped? Just all of a sudden?”

“When I awoke, it was covered in a film of soot as if someone had rolled it in the remains of a fire,” he said.

“It probably stopped working because two of the exact same thing can’t coexist in the same time period in the same space,” Alex interjected suddenly. He sounded excited, but when Altaїr, Shaun and Rebecca turned to look at him, he scowled and turned a cold shoulder on them.

“How do you know that?” Rebecca asked.

Alex shrugged and looked down at the ground. “I read a lot, I guess,” he said.

“When do you have time to read?” Altaїr demanded of him. “What kind of books do you read that would lead you to believe something absurd like that?”

“It’s not actually that absurd,” Shaun piped up. “Think about it, what has every Sci-fi movie and television show released since Star Trek proposed when time travel is involved? If something is displaced in time, things inevitably start going wrong with it. The Apple was transported through time and space, and now it’s wound up malfunctioning. It isn’t that far-fetched.”

Altaїr stared uncomprehendingly at the Englishman. He had either just said something truly brilliant, or he was speaking utter nonsense and the others were too frightened of him or too polite to point it out.

“We’ve gotten a lot more creative in our storytelling,” Shaun explained. “Don’t worry about keeping up with the conversation, this part isn’t all that important. We’re just speculating.”

“Well, instead of spitballing ideas,” Alex interjected, “how about we start trying to do something about getting _him_ back where he belongs?” He jabbed a finger at Altaїr to emphasize his words, earning a grimace of displeasure from the assassin.

“What if....,” Rebecca began, but her words trailed off and she bit her lip, looking down at the floor. Altaїr wondered why no one wanted to speak their mind. Was it commonplace in this time for everyone to hesitate before speaking? If so, it was quite an irritating trend.

“Go on,” Shaun prompted her. “What is it?”

She shook her head, but seemed to overcome her reservations. “What if what happened to the Apple is happening to Desmond?” she said quickly, and her words tripped over themselves in their haste. “What if...the way it stopped working...I mean, it could happen.”

“That would explain a few things,” Shaun said slowly. He stared off toward the loft and seemed to shake himself, looking over at Altaїr. “We need to get this one back to his time immediately.”

“I agree,” Alex said loudly, throwing his arms into the air. “That’s what I’ve been trying to say from the start. Now listen, I think if we tinker around with the Apple long enough we might be able to--”

“I’m sorry,” Altaїr interrupted, turning to face the other, “but you seem to have invited yourself into this discussion. Were you not complaining just a moment ago about no one listening to you?”

Looking taken aback, Alex drew himself up, squaring his shoulders. “I was,” he agreed. “But--”

“Then I suggest you take this opportunity as your leave,” the assassin said. “After all, you would be hard-pressed to take time out of your busy schedule to help someone in need.” His eyes narrowed and he continued in a cold voice, “Not without reminding that someone incessantly about the good deed you had done for him.”

Alex stared at him, obviously shocked to be spoken to in such a way, but his indignation didn’t last long. It was soon replaced with anger, and he opened his mouth as if to retort, only to be interrupted by Shaun’s much softer and more reasonable voice.

“Listen mate, you’ve done your part,” he said. “You got him here. You’re off the hook. We can take care of things from--”

“Butt the fuck out, Limey,” Alex snarled viciously, “I haven’t forgotten that bullshit you pulled in the alley. I’m gonna get you back for that and it ain’t gonna be pretty when I do.”

Shaun balked at being spoken to this way, and his face twisted in an expression of fury. “Just you try it, you bloody Yank,” he shouted. Admittedly though, even if he hadn’t been at least six inches shorter than Alex, he wasn’t the least bit intimidating.

“Enough!” Rebecca shouted, taking a step forward to put herself between to two.

In the resulting silence, Altaїr rounded on Alex and stared him down. He wasted no time, but kept his voice calm and quiet. “You will do no harm to these people,” he said. “You have done nothing but serve your own interests since I arrived, and for that I do not blame you. Any man in your situation would do the same, myself included. But if you believe yourself so entitled to hurt these people who offer me aid, I urge you to reconsider. Because if you so much as raise a hand against them or myself, I will end you, Alexander. I will be silent, I will be ruthless, and you will not see me coming. Am I understood?”

Alex stared at him, his lips pressed into a thin line and his eyes hard as stones. His hands were curled into fists at his sides, but if he wanted to strike Altaїr, he controlled the impulse well. “Fine,” he said in a tight voice. He looked from Altaïr, to Shaun and then Rebecca, finally settling on the assassin before him. “Then I’m out. I’ve handled your own special brand of crazy for long enough.” He stalked forward, shoulder-checking Altaїr hard enough to knock him back a step. Then he left the building.

And Altaїr followed.

The second he stepped foot outside, he was grabbed by the shirt and shoved bodily into the side of the warehouse. “What the _fuck_ was that about?” Alex snarled.

“That was us parting ways,” Altaїr sneered. He lifted his arms up between the other’s hands and broke his hold with a fist to each forearm. Then he snatched Alex by the hair and bent him back until his knees buckled and he fell to the ground, straining to stay upright.

“So I guess what happened in the alley meant nothing?” Alex panted, grinning in a pained way that showed too many teeth. “Just a sport fuck to make yourself feel good? Was my ass nice compared to your little wifey’s? Did you like shoving me against those bricks? Or do you prefer--” Altaїr didn’t get to find out what he might prefer, because he drew his arm back and punched Alex as hard as he could in the mouth, and when the other man fell back onto the pavement, he drove a heel right between his watering eyes. Bone caved under his weight, and he watched dispassionately as blood and thicker things leaked from the ruin of Alex’s face.

“Recover from that,” he said, wiping his shoe on Alex’s shirt. When he turned and headed back inside, Alex hadn’t stirred, and he felt a small thrill of fear shiver up his spine--what if he couldn’t heal damage that severe? What if Altaїr had just killed him…?

_He deserved it_ , a righteous and cold voice said in the back of his head.

Perhaps he did, but the looks of shock and horror on Rebecca and Shaun’s faces when he walked back into the warehouse told him that what he’d just done had crossed a line, and he didn’t think he could reclaim those last few steps.

 


	17. We're not dead!!

Hey folks, I'm sorry there hasn't been any updates at all in a long time. The good news is we aren't dead! Hurrahs all around. 

I am, however, rather sorry to give you guys some bad news. We're officially putting this story on hiatus. Neither of us have time to write along with everything else we gotta do. And when there is time, there is no motivation. 

The silver lining with this message though is we aren't giving up on this story and there will be an update. We just aren't sure when.

Thank you guys all for the support of this story.


End file.
